Genetic control of heterochrony in Eucalyptus globulus

A change in the timing or rate of developmental events throughout ontogeny is referred to as heterochrony, and it is a major evolutionary process in plants and animals. We investigated the genetic basis for natural variation in the timing of vegetative phase change in the tree Eucalyptus globulus, which undergoes a dramatic change in vegetative morphology during the juvenile-to-adult transition. Quantitative trait loci analysis in an outcross F2 family derived from crosses between individuals from a coastal population of E. globulus with precocious vegetative phase change and individuals from populations in which vegetative phase change occurs several years later implicated the microRNA EglMIR156.5 as a potential contributor to this heterochronic difference. Additional evidence for the involvement of EglMIR156.5 was provided by its differential expression in trees with early and late phase change. Our findings suggest that changes in the expression of miR156 underlie natural variation in vegetative phase change in E. globulus, and may also explain interspecific differences in the timing of this developmental transition.