Naturally occurring allele diversity allows potato cultivation in northern latitudes
Authors: José A Abelenda
Cezary Smaczniak
Marian Oortwijn
Beatrix M Horvath
Herman J van Eck
María del Mar Carretero Gomez
Krissana Kowitwanich
Christian W B Bachem
Bjorn Kloosterman
Salomé Prat
Richard G F Visser
Jan M de Boer
Journal: Nature (2013)
Discipline: Multidisciplinary
Keywords: Potato; Solanum tuberosum L.; tuber formation; quantitative trait locus; DOF transcription factors
Affiliations: Laboratory of Plant Breeding, Department of Plant Sciences, Wageningen-UR, PO Box 386, 6700 AJ Wageningen, The Netherlands.

Abstract:  Potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) originates from the Andes and evolved short-day-dependent tuber formation as a vegetative propagation strategy. Here we describe the identification of a central regulator underlying a major-effect quantitative trait locus for plant maturity and initiation of tuber development. We show that this gene belongs to the family of DOF (DNA-binding with one finger) transcription factors and regulates tuberization and plant life cycle length, by acting as a mediator between the circadian clock and the StSP6A mobile tuberization signal. We also show that natural allelic variants evade post-translational light regulation, allowing cultivation outside the geographical centre of origin of potato. Potato is a member of the Solanaceae family and is one of the world's most important food crops. This annual plant originates from the Andean regions of South America. Potato develops tubers from underground stems called stolons. Its equatorial origin makes potato essentially short-day dependent for tuberization and potato will not make tubers in the long-day conditions of spring and summer in the northern latitudes. When introduced in temperate zones, wild material will form tubers in the course of the autumnal shortening of day-length. Thus, one of the first selected traits in potato leading to a European potato type is likely to have been long-day acclimation for tuberization. Potato breeders can exploit the naturally occurring variation in tuberization onset and life cycle length, allowing varietal breeding for different latitudes, harvest times and markets. 

Retracted: No

PubPeer comments:
 **Figure 2a**, two yeast colonies appear to be much more similar than expected (**red boxes**). Resolution is particularly low, and I wonder why. However, please look at **zoom in** more down. There are other pairs of colonies I find very similar to one another, actually. Also, it looks like each colony was cropped and laid over a background. Could the authors please post a higher resolution version of this figure, and take away any concern? ![file] , 
 Dear Aneurus Inconstans, Nice to see that people are still interested in the the research! I think this is a reasonable question and I m not sure why these differences in apparent resolution appear. I took a quick look to see if I still have any original pictures from these experiments and below are the ones I found. However, I don t think that this jpeg is the one that was actually used for the figure - they are too low resolution. Rather, this is an independent photo from the same plate (note the  bump in the third colony of the lower - StGI StCDF1.2 interaction), which I hope provides additional confidence in the result presented. ![file] , 
 #2 Thank you for your ready reply. Yes, indeed this image provides additional confidence in the result presented, but it doesn t seem to be the published image, and it does not fully sweep away concerns on similarity between colonies highlighted in #1. , 
 I am pleased you have (additional) confidence in the results we presented in this paper. Indeed, we have repeated these experiments quite recently in the course of our further research and obtained the same results - albeit with slightly different constructs. As to your continued concerns, I would ask you just to analyse carefully the images you yourself posted in this thread - it is very obvious that the two colonies are different. Not only is the left colony slightly darker than the right one, but also the individual pixels are distinctly different in the StCDF1.2 and StCDF1.3 : StGI colonies. However, if you still have any niggling doubts, I d be very pleased if you would consider independently repeating the experiment for which I would be happy to provide you with the relevant constructs and protocols. Alternatively, you can wait a little while, for our new publication confirming these results and providing a plethora of very exiting new data on the interactions of StCDF1 and its various allelic variants with a series of other proteins that we will submit soon. ,