Fig. 1: (a) Multiple sequence alignment of PEBP-like protein sequences. Sequences were aligned using the MUSCLE alignment tool. The red asterisks indicate the conserved and key amino acid residues required for the corresponding activity of FT and TFL1-like sequences. The band at the bottom of the alignment represents the percentage of conservation of the amino acids at a position. Red indicates stronger conservation while blue represents variable sequences. (b) Phylogenetic reconstruction of the PEBP-gene family with homologous C. pallens sequences . The evolutionary history was inferred by using the Maximum Likelihood method based on the JTT matrix-based model. The bootstrap consensus tree inferred from 1000 replicates is taken to represent the evolutionary history of the taxa analysed. Aly: Arabidopsis lyrata subsp. lyrata, Ath: Arabidopsis thaliana , Ac: Allium cepa, Bv:Beta vulgaris, Bd: Brachypodium distachyon, Cs:Chrysanthemum seticuspe , Chm: Chrysanthemum X morifolium,Gm: Glycine max, Ha: Helianthus annuus, Nt:Nicotiana tabacum , Osa: Oryza sativa, Ptr:Populus trichocarpa, ZCN: Zea mays and C. pallens . Branches in red colour represent the MFT clade, blue represent theTFL1 clade and green represent the FT clade. (c) Functional characterisation of the C. pallens PEBP- like sequences. The number of rosette leaves of the transgenic and the wild‐type plants at flowering (mean ± SD, n = 10). (Significance of transgenic and control plants compared to Ler ft-1 , Student’s t-test *** P < 0.001, ** P <0.01).