Over-expression of CONSTANS-LIKE 5 can induce flowering in short-day grown Arabidopsis

To ensure that the initiation of flowering occurs at the correct time of year, plants need to integrate a diverse range of external and internal signals. In Arabidopsis, the photoperiodic flowering pathway is controlled by a set of regulators that include CONSTANS (CO). In addition, Arabidopsis plants also have a family of genes with homologies to CO known as CO-LIKE (COL) about which relatively little is known. In this paper, we describe the regulation and interactions of a novel member of the family, COL5. The expression of COL5 is under circadian and diurnal regulation, but COL5 itself does not appear to affect circadian rhythms. COL5, like CO, is regulated by GIGANTEA. Furthermore, COL5 is expressed in the vascular tissue. Using COL5 over-expressing lines we show that, under short days, constitutive expression of COL5 affects flowering time and the expression of the floral integrator genes, FLOWERING LOCUS T and SUPPRESSOR OF OVEREXPRESSION OF CO 1. Constitutive expression of COL5 partially suppresses the late flowering phenotype of the co-mutant plants. However, plants with loss of COL5 function do not show altered flowering. Taken together, our results suggest that COL5 has COL activity, but may either not have a role in regulating flowering in wild-type plants or may act redundantly with other flowering regulators.