Karina van der Linde: Homer´s myth of the Trojan horse meets small proteins in Zea mays anther development

Plants lack a germ line, thus within the flower somatic cells must switch from mitotic proliferation to competence for meiosis. This process is highly dependent on small protein signaling. In maize (Zea mays) anthers we defined the roles of two small proteins, MSCA1 and MAC1, that are sequentially required for cell fate specification of pre-meiotic cells and anther lobe soma, respectively. Thousands more small proteins with unknown roles in maize anther development have been identified but are not yet characterized. To analyze these candidate developmental regulators, we were inspired by Homer´s Trojan horse myth and developed a novel system to deliver tagged proteins into maize in a highly localized fashion by using a genetically modified version of the biotrophic maize pathogen Ustilago maydis. This new technique offers the possibility of rapid testing of predicted secreted maize proteins for in vivo functions.