Teosinte alleles enhance nitrogen assimilation and seed protein in maize

We thank J. Zhang and X. Zhang at Henan University for their expertise and assistance in the quantification of organic acids and free amino acids. We thank J. Tang and X. Zhou from Inspection Technology in Zhongtu for their comprehensive technical support in characterizing the field trial environments; specifically, for their precise determination of soil types, residual N levels and the exact composition of mineral fertilizers used in our NUE assessments. Furthermore, we thank the Chongqing Institute of Green and Intelligent Technology for providing access to the EA-IRMS facility, and particularly Z. Yang for her expert technical support and assistance with the 15N isotope measurements. This research was supported by the Strategic Priority Research Programme of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (grant no. XDB1120000 to Y.W. and H.W.), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant nos. 32430074 and 32525007 to Y.W., grant nos. 32322060 and 32441031 to Y.H., grant no. 32472076 to H.W. and grant no. 32372068 to W.W.), Shanghai Academy of Natural Sciences (to Y.W. and Y. Zhang), THE XPLORER PRIZE (to Y.W.), the Ray Wu Angel Grant, the Excellent Youth Foundation of Sichuan Scientific Committee (grant no. 2025NSFJQ0033 to Y.H.), the Biological Breeding-National Science and Technology Major Project (grant no. 2023ZD04069 to H.W., Y.W., W.W. and Y.H.), the open funds of the State Key Laboratory of Maize Bio-breeding (grant no. SKLMB2025K03 to Y.H.), Shanghai Agricultural Science and Technology (grant no. K2025016 to Y.W.) and the Shandong Provincial Key Research and Development Programme (grant no. 2024LZGC008 to Y.W.).