Maize plants grown on low pH soil incur plural meiotic abnormalities during microsporogenesis

Cell division is regulated by a series of intrinsic processes to realize normality. However, influence of external factors, such as soil acidity can cause abnormalities that affect meiosis or mitosis stability. For a better understanding of the impact of soil conditions on cell division, we evaluated meiotic behavior of four maize inbred lines (named IL1, IL2, IL3 and IL4) in an advanced stage of inbreeding, and two respective double hybrids (DH1 and DH2), grown on acidic soils of Brazilian savanna. We observed plural meiotic abnormalities, such as absence of first division, irregular spindles, chromosome shattering, chromosome stickiness, and defective cytokinesis, among others in the 31.6% of the PMCs. Such multiple cellular aberrations can affect the efficiency of the gametes and thereby reducing the productivity of crops.