Natural variation of polyglutamine repeats of a circadian clock gene ELF3 in Arabidopsis

Abstract

EARLY FLOWERING 3 (ELF3) plays key roles in the control of circadian rhythms, photoperiodic flowering, hypocotyls length and response to light in Arabidopsis. ELF3, however, encodes a protein without any motifs or domains of known function. Biochemical function of ELF3 has been largely unknown. Here we show the first demonstration of diversity of numbers of polyglutamines in the ELF3 among 60 Arabidopsis wild-type accessions. Significant correlation of the numbers of polyglutamines in ELF3 with two parameters of circadian rhythms, period and phase, suggest that the length of polyglutamine tract may affect the functions of ELF3 in the control of circadian rhythms. Copyright © 2007 The Japanese Society for Plant Cell and Molecular Biology.