Abstract
Morphologies of flowers and inflorescences in monocots are distinct from those of flowers and inflorescences in eudicots. Especially in grasses, the inflorescences comprise of unique structural units, the spikelet and the floret. The rice spikelet has one floret, which is subtended by two tiny glume-like organs, called sterile lemma and rudimentary glumes. These organs are specific to the rice. To elucidate the developmental mechanism of these organ and their evolutionary origin, we have focused on a rice mutant, in which these organs are aberrant. Here, we report phenotypic analysis of this mutant, isolation of the gene responsible for the mutation, and its function.
