whole plant fruit ripening stage

[planteome-user]

The existing term 6 ripening stage (PO:0007010) is defined as "Maturation of the fruit. " There are two major problems with this definition: one, it describes a process, not a stage, and two, it refers to development of a fruit, rather than to the development of a whole plant.

After reviewing the history of the PO and discussing this term at the POC meetings on 9-4-12, we agreed that this term was originally created to describe a whole plant development stage during which fruit is ripening. We agreed to change the name and definition accordingly.

New proposed name: whole plant fruit ripening stage.

New proposed def.: A sporophyte reproductive stage (PO:0007130) during which a fruit (PO:0009001) on a whole plant (PO:0000003) is undergoing ripening (GO:0009835).

comment: This term is to be used for a stage of development of a whole plant. For the stages of development of an individual fruit, see fruit development stage (PO:0001002). An annual plant will only have one fruit ripening stage in its life, which is generally followed by a sporophyte senescent stage (PO:0007017), while a perennial may have one fruit ripening stage for each growing season. In plants with continuous (i.e., indeterminate) fruit development (GO:0010154), new fruits may continue to develop after the first fruit has begun to ripen and the fruit ripening stage of whole plant has begun.

has_part fruit development stage (PO:0001002) (This could be made more specific, after we add specific types of fruit development stages.)

subset for angiosperms

The definition needs some work to clarify when this stage ends, particularly for perennials. We should also add a comment that ripening is a type of senescence and a comment to distinguish this stage from senescent stage of whole plant.We expect that this definition will change slightly as we work on the new and revised terms for fruit development stages.

Reported by: rlwalls2008

Original Ticket: obo/plant-ontology-po-term-requests/498