Links to online resources

MarpolBase
Genome database for Marchantia polymorpha featuring high quality reference genome sequences.
https://marchantia.info

Published description at: Plant and Cell Physiology, 67: 377–388, 2026.
https://doi.org/10.1093/pcp/pcaf159

British Bryological Society notes
https://www.britishbryologicalsociety.org.uk/learning/species-finder/marchantia-polymorpha/

Background article: The liverwort Marchantia polymorpha, a model for all ages.

The liverwort Marchantia polymorpha has been known to man for millennia due to its inclusion Greek herbals. Perhaps due to its familiarity and association with growth in, often, man-made disturbed habitats, it was readily used to address fundamental biological questions of the day, including elucidation of land plant life cycles in the late 18th century, the formulation of cell theory early in the 19th century and the discovery of the alternation of generations in land plants in the mid-19th century. Subsequently, Marchantia was used as model in botany classes. With the arrival of the molecular era, its organellar genomes, the chloroplast and mitochondrial, were some of the first to be sequenced from any plant. In the past two decades, molecular genetic tools have been applied such that genes may be manipulated seemingly at will. Here, are past, present, and some views to the future of Marchantia as a model.
Bowman, JL. Current Topics in Developmental Biology 147:1-32, 2022.
https://doi.org/10.1016/bs.ctdb.2021.12.009

Background article: The renaissance and enlightenment of Marchantia as a model system.

The liverwort Marchantia polymorpha has been utilized as a model for biological studies since the 18th century. In the past few decades, there has been a Renaissance in its utilization in genomic and genetic approaches to investigating physiological, developmental, and evolutionary aspects of land plant biology. The reasons for its adoption are similar to those of other genetic models, e.g. simple cultivation, ready access via its worldwide distribution, ease of crossing, facile genetics, and more recently, efficient transformation, genome editing, and genomic resources. The haploid gametophyte dominant life cycle of M. polymorpha is conducive to forward genetic approaches. The lack of ancient whole-genome duplications within liverworts facilitates reverse genetic approaches, and possibly related to this genomic stability, liverworts possess sex chromosomes that evolved in the ancestral liverwort. As a representative of one of the three bryophyte lineages, its phylogenetic position allows comparative approaches to provide insights into ancestral land plants. Given the karyotype and genome stability within liverworts, the resources developed for M. polymorphahave facilitated the development of related species as models for biological processes lacking in M. polymorpha.
Bowman et al. The Plant Cell, 34:3512–3542, 2022.
https://doi.org/10.1093/plcell/koac219