Minutes POC Conf Call 4-1-10

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POC meeting,Webex Conference Call; Date: April 1, 2010 10am


New terms. Posted on SourceForge tracker for comments.

At the Ithaca meeting, we proposed having simple plant organ and compound plant organ as children of plant organ. We need to decide if it is necessary to retain these terms, now that we have collective plant structure.


1. simple organ

Proposed def'n: A plant organ that does not contain any other plant organ as a part.

Examples: petal, root, simple leaf. [source: rw:test]

Comment: This term may not be necessary, since it is covered by our current definition of plant organ (RW)


2. compound organ

Proposed def'n: Compound organ: plant organ that has as its parts two or more simple plant organs.

Example: fern sorus composed of multiple sporangia or gyneocium composed of multiple carpels, also compound leaf.

Comment: This term may not be necessary, since it is covered by our current definition collective plant structure (RW).


3. spore:

This term is currently missing from the PO. We need to come up with a definition.

Raven,Evert, Eichorn, 4th Ed defines it as: A reproductive cell, usually unicellular, capable of developing into an adult without fusion with another cell. ()

proposed def'n: A plant cell that arises through meiosis and develops into the gametophyte.

comments: the product of meiosis, is_a plant cell, parent of megaspore, microspore, develops into the gametophyte

Are there any cases where the spore is multicellular?


Item from last week's agenda:


4. New is_a children of collective plant structure:

(collective plant structure def'n: A plant structure that is a proper part of a plant and is composed of two or more organs and any associated portions of plant tissue.)

We can deal with definitions and relationships of each term later, but for now we simply need to approve moving them to 'children of collective plant structure'. These terms had no is_a parents.

No definitions or part_of relationships have been changed.

Does everyone agree that these terms should be children of collective plant structure?

  • andreocium- "Collectively, the stamens of one flower."
  • calyx- "The sepals of one flower collectively."
  • corolla- "The petals of a flower collectively."
  • epicalyx-"A whorl of structures immediately outside the calyx whorl."
  • flower- "A heterosporangiate strobilus, typically consisting of androecium, gynoecium, usually surrounded by a perianth and borne on an axis or receptacle."
  • gynoecium- "Collectively the carpels of a flower."
  • inflorescence-"That part of the axial system of plants above the uppermost foliage leaf/pair of foliage leaves that bears flowers."
  • infructescence- "The grouping or arrangement in which fruits are borne on a plant."
  • involucre- "A whorl of bracts at the base of a cluster of flowers as found in Asteraceae or Compositae."
  • perianth- "Non-fertile parts of a flower surrounding the fertile organs, collectively the calyx and corolla of a flower, or only a single whorl."
  • spikelet- "Ultimate and congested inflorescence branch of the grasses."
  • phyllome whorl (was is_a phyllome)- "A circular arrangement of phyllome." This term is a special case (see SF tracker) since it was previously a child of phyllome (probably incorrectly). Could be eliminated?


5. Organ margin This term was discussed on last week's conference call.

Proposed def'n: The edge of an organ and the area immediately internally adjacent to it.

-Added new is_a children for all appropriate children of phyllome, that is, all laminar structures. These are new terms (except for sepal, leaflet and leaf margin)- do we need to create SF tracker items for these?

from Dev browser:

  • PO:0025008: petal margin
  • PO:0025011: bract margin
  • PO:0025012: cotyledon margin
  • PO:0025013: prophyll margin
  • PO:0025014: scale leaf margin
  • PO:0025016: sporophyll margin
  • PO:0025015: tepal margin
  • PO:0005021: sepal margin
  • PO:0020128: leaf margin
  • PO:0006034: leaflet margin (leaflet is_a cardinal organ part)


6. Leaf margin:

Proposed def'n: The margin of any flattened portion of a leaf.

- will have children 'leaf lamina margin' and 'leaf petiole margin' .

  • PO:0025009: leaf lamina margin
  • PO:0025010: petiole margin


If everyone agrees with these changes, we can close this item.


7. Re-organization of existing terms


  • floral bract and inflorescence bract

These two terms were children of both plant organ and bract (which is_a organ). Deleted is_a relationships to plant organ and kept under bract.

  • fruit

Is a fruit an organ?

Current def'n: The seed-bearing structure in angiosperms, formed from the ovary after flowering. [source: APWeb:Glossary, POC:curators]

MAG: fruit fits our definition of a plant organ


8. Outreach page on PO wiki The outreach page on the PO wiki has been updated with abstracts. See http://wiki.plantontology.org:8080/index.php/POC_Outreach_Events. We will continue to keep this updated so people can have quick access to abstracts and outreach activities.


Question: There is a similar page on the POC website- http://www.plantontology.org/docs/otherdocs/poc_outreach.html

Maybe we could have both links go to the same place, so we don't have to keep two pages updated?

Also: POC Homepage (http://www.plantontology.org) has been updated with upcoming presentations


9. Upcoming Conferences and Meetings: Any updates??

  • Bio-Ontologies 2010: Semantic Applications in Life Sciences. July 9th and 10th, 2010, Boston, Mass. Satellite Interest Group (SIG) meeting preceding the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB). Laurel, Ramona may be going (?). Abstract/short paper submission deadline 4/15/10.

We need to discuss what would be the most appropriate type of presentation for this meeting; there are 3 categories:

-Short papers, up to 4 pages: (for ~20 minute presentation, if selected, and publication in the Proceedings booklet)

-Flash updates, up to 1 page: (short talks (5 min) giving the salient new developments on existing public ontologies)

-Poster abstracts, up to 1 page (posters will be up for 2 days, with at least 1 poster session) Poster authors can also do a flash update.

Laurel and Ramona are preparing a short paper for submission to to Bio-Ontologies meeting.


  • Botanical Society of America (BSA)- July 31-Aug 4th 2010. Providence, Rhode Island. Ramona presenting, Dennis attending, 15 minute oral presentation, Abstract submitted 3/26/10.


  • International Botanical Congress (IBC2011). July 23rd-30th 2011, Melbourne, Australia. Important dates (http://www.ibc2011.com/Dates.htm): "Call of symposia closes" 3-31-10, Abstracts submission deadline: 12-1-10.

from 3-23-10: Dennis and Alejandra are planning to attend IBC2011. Dennis will work on possible symposium proposals. Pankaj can be co-organizer if necessary. Need 4-6 speakers for the symposium. Laurel and Ramona are interested in going if funds are available



  • Annotation workshop/POC meeting to be held in Corvallis. Ramona will be in Portland June 26-29. Could have meeting one of those days (depending on when her talk is scheduled) or on June 30th.
  • Annotation workshops to be held at NYBG in fall 2010. Date TBD.


11. Next meeting scheduled for 04-xx-2010 at xx time

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