| Abstract: | Flower bud differentiation is a key component of plant blooming biology and understanding how it works is vitalfor flowering regulation and plant genetic breeding, increasing the number and quality of flowering. Red soil is themost widely covered soil type in the world, and it is also the most suitable soil type for crape myrtle planting. Theflower buds of crape myrtle (Lagerstroemia indica) planted in red soil were employed as experimental materials inthis study, and the distinct periods of differentiation were identified using stereomicroscopy and paraffin sectioning. We optimized the steps of dehydration, transparency, embedding, sectioning and staining when employingparaffin sections. When seen under a microscope, this optimization can make the cell structure of paraffin sections obvious, the tissue structure complete, and the staining clear and natural. The flower bud differentiationprocess is divided into 7 periods based on anatomical observations of the external morphology and internal structure during flower bud differentiation: undifferentiated period, start of differentiation period, inflorescence differentiation period, calyx differentiation period, petal differentiation period, stamen differentiation period, and pistildifferentiation period. The differentiation time is concentrated from the end of May to mid-June. Crape myrtleflower bud differentiation is a complicated process, and the specific regulatory mechanism and affecting elementsneed to be investigated further. |
