About the Authors

Ying Li

Affiliation Department of Crop Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, United States of America

Kranthi Varala

Affiliation Department of Crop Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, United States of America

Stephen P. Moose

Affiliations Department of Crop Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, United States of America, Energy Biosciences Institute, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, United States of America

Matthew E. Hudson

mhudson@illinois.edu

Affiliations Department of Crop Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, United States of America, Energy Biosciences Institute, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have read the journal's policy and have the following conflicts: MH is an academic editor of PLOS ONE. This does not alter the authors' adherence to all the PLOS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: MEH SPM YL. Performed the experiments: YL. Analyzed the data: YL KV. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: YL KV MEH. Wrote the paper: YL MEH.