In rice, the flower consists of the pistil, six stamens, and two lodicules and is enclosed in the lemma and palea. The genetic orchestration of floral differentiation has been elaborated to some degree in several angiosperms, including rice, and many of the key homeotic genes that directly underlie floral development prove to encode transcription factors of the MADS box type. On pages 871–884 of this issue, Jeon et al. analyze the results of impairment in the function of the OsMADS1 gene, a rice MADS box gene. Interestingly, the mutant phenotype resembles the leafy hull sterile1 (lhs1) mutant, and the authors verify the lhs1 individuals to result from homeotic mutation of the OsMADS1 gene. The cover shows the phenotypes of the wild-type (upper left) and lhs1 (lower right) panicles. The scanning electron micrograph (boxed) shows that the mutant lhs1 spikelets can be associated with elongated lodicules, a decrease in stamen number, and an additional floret. The mutated MADS box gene in rice thus reveals the role of OsMADS1 in determining floral meristem identity and the elaboration of floral organ development.