用促进成熟法促进开花一个重要的方面是植物已经具有感受寒冷冬季并在春季记住冬季寒冷爆发的能力。最近对拟南芥（Arabidopsis）的研究显示了植物记忆冬季的分子基础：促进成熟促使一个开花抑制基因（FLOWERING LOCUS C，FLC）的染色质结构的改变，这种改变使这个基因从抑制状态转为有丝分裂稳定。促进成熟途径中一个关键成分，一个含有PHD domain 的蛋白（VERNALIZATION INSENSITIVE3，VIN3），只在寒冷延长期后才出现。VIN3与FLC染色质结构修饰的起始有关。FLC的稳定沉默也需要DNA结合蛋白VERNALIZATION1（VRN1）和蜂巢状蛋白VRN2。

One of the remarkable aspects of the promotion of flowering by vernalization is that plants have evolved the ability to measure a complete winter season of cold and to “remember” this prior cold exposure in the spring.  Recent work in Arabidopsis demonstrates the molecular basis of this memory of winter:  vernalization causes changes in the chromatin strcture of a flowering repressor gene, FLOWERING LOCUS (FLC), that switch this gene into a repressed state that is mitotically stable.  A key component of the vernalization pathway, VERNALIZATION INSENSITIVE3 (VIN3), which is a PHD-domain-containing protein, is induced only after a prolonged period of cold.  VIN3 is involved in initiating the modification of FLC chromatin structure.  The stable silencing of FLC also requires the DNA-binding protein VERNALIZATION1 (VRN1) and the polycomb-group protein VRN2.