ARF3-mediated auxin signaling is essential for sex determination in cucumber
Sex determination underpins genesis of male and female flowers with particularly important implications in plant breeding. Auxin and ethylene regulate femaleness in cucurbits. In this work, we identified an <i>auxin response factor 3</i> (<i>CsARF3</i>) that plays an essential role in carpel development in cucumber. Deletion of <i>CsARF3</i> resulted in an androecious phenotype with only male flowers, whereas overexpression of <i>CsARF3</i> led to an increased number of female flowers. CsARF3 promotes femaleness by directly stimulating the expression of the meristem maintenance gene <i>CsSTM</i> and repressing the activity of the gynoecious gene <i>CsWIP1</i>. Auxin and ethylene exhibit a reciprocal relationship during sex determination, in which ethylene promotes carpel formation through auxin at the early stage of flower development. The auxin signaling in carpels then enhances ethylene biosynthesis to inhibit stamen development.
Authors
- Min Li (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0901-5543)
- Jingyu Guo (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7700-6468)
- Jianyu Zhao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8147-7879)
- Chaoheng Gu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0002-0144-7165)
- Zhaoyang Zhou (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2178-9525)
- Junjun Shen (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8321-1521)
- Lijie Han (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0007-7892-6478)
- Yafei Huang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0004-7443-4204)
- Liu Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0004-2050-430X)
- Bosi Zhao (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0004-9502-8651)
- S. P. Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0000-5206-8013)
- Yuting He (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5743-8770)
- Zheng Li (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3188-8300)
- Zhongyi Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7537-4053)
- Xiaolan Zhang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6343-3116)
- Liming Wang (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0003-9468-7623)
- Ye Liu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0005-4855-906X)
- Chuang Li (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0006-4701-4858)
- Haoran Geng (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5115-4446)
- Zhihan Liu
Institutions
- North West Agriculture and Forestry University (CN)
- China Agricultural University (CN)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Science
- Published
- 2025-12-11
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adv2006
- Citations
- 1
- Primary Topic
- Advances in Cucurbitaceae Research
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 1.82