Epigenetic mechanisms in plants and their implications in plant breeding

Abstract

Higher organisms, including plants, use three systems to initiate and sustain epigenetic gene regulation: DNA methylation, histone modification and RNA-interference. Unraveling the relationships between these epigenetic components has led to surprising and rapidly evolving new concepts, showing how they interact and stabilize each other. These interacting systems can regulate expression or silencing of genes, resulting in epigenetically controlled phenotypes that can be meiotically or mitotically heritable. In this review we discuss issues relevant to the involvement of epigenetic inheritance as a source of polymorphism generating useful variation for selecting superior genotypes. The role of methylation in hybrid vigor and stability of performance, and aspects of epigenetic transgene silencing in elite transgenic varieties will also be addressed.