How plants open up: revealing the evolution of stomatal opening mechanisms. This project aims to identify novel and conserved mechanisms that drive the opening of stomata – plant pores that enable CO2 acquisition for photosynthesis. Stomatal movements strongly affect plant productivity and water use efficiency and have profoundly influenced the earth’s climate and terrestrial ecology. This project will address critical gaps in our understanding of how plants open stomata in response to their env ....How plants open up: revealing the evolution of stomatal opening mechanisms. This project aims to identify novel and conserved mechanisms that drive the opening of stomata – plant pores that enable CO2 acquisition for photosynthesis. Stomatal movements strongly affect plant productivity and water use efficiency and have profoundly influenced the earth’s climate and terrestrial ecology. This project will address critical gaps in our understanding of how plants open stomata in response to their environment and the evolutionary history of the genes controlling this fundamental process. A major expected outcome is knowledge of the diversity of stomatal opening pathways, which should ultimately lead to improved predictions of plant responses to environmental change and assist future targeted modification of plant growth.Read moreRead less
Deciphering the Thermal Acclimation of Mitochondrial Respiration. Plants acclimate to the extremes of temperature following a pre-exposure to a sub-lethal increase/decrease in temperature. Recent research has revealed that proteins of oxidative phosphorylation and the tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle are dynamic and change their abundance in response to temperature change. Harnessing a cutting edge protein mass spectrometry approach, this project seeks to better understand how mitochondrial respir ....Deciphering the Thermal Acclimation of Mitochondrial Respiration. Plants acclimate to the extremes of temperature following a pre-exposure to a sub-lethal increase/decrease in temperature. Recent research has revealed that proteins of oxidative phosphorylation and the tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle are dynamic and change their abundance in response to temperature change. Harnessing a cutting edge protein mass spectrometry approach, this project seeks to better understand how mitochondrial respiration and hence adenosine triphosphate (ATP) production is maintained during temperature change. Uniquely this project will examine this in both the model plant Arabidopsis and wheat and combine both tissue, environment-induced and genotype variation to reveal a new understanding of the thermal acclimation of this major mitochondrial process.Read moreRead less
Linkage Infrastructure, Equipment And Facilities - Grant ID: LE130100081
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$500,000.00
Summary
Spectral climate chamber facilities for phenomic studies of plant light response adaptation. Climates are changing, altering planting regimes in agriculture, and disrupting local adaptation in foundation species. The genetic basis of climate adaptation will be dissected in new plant growth facilities, equipped with real-time imaging and environmental controls that can mimic dynamic seasonal growing conditions and weather stress events.
Deciphering a protein code for recognising Ribonucleic acid (RNA) targets. This project will decipher the protein code employed by a large family of plant proteins for the specific recognition of RNA sequences. This knowledge will be immediately helpful for designing a new generation of biotechnological tools for the agricultural and biomedical sciences.
Australian Laureate Fellowships - Grant ID: FL140100179
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$2,800,000.00
Summary
Controlling gene expression with synthetic RNA-binding proteins. Controlling gene expression with synthetic RNA-binding proteins. The growth and development of living organisms is largely determined by the genes they contain, but converting the genetic information into biological activity requires intermediary processes involving RNA and proteins that bind to and process RNA. This project aims to understand how the largest class of RNA-binding protein in plants recognise their target RNAs and ai ....Controlling gene expression with synthetic RNA-binding proteins. Controlling gene expression with synthetic RNA-binding proteins. The growth and development of living organisms is largely determined by the genes they contain, but converting the genetic information into biological activity requires intermediary processes involving RNA and proteins that bind to and process RNA. This project aims to understand how the largest class of RNA-binding protein in plants recognise their target RNAs and aims to develop custom-designed proteins for switching genes on or off. This technology will be used to create new hybrid cereal varieties and will also be valuable for applications in human health, such as the correction of genetic mutations.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE120101117
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$375,000.00
Summary
Understanding the molecular machines making proteins essential for life: investigating specialisation of plastid ribosome composition and function. Plastid ribosomes are complex molecular machines responsible for the production of proteins required for photosynthesis, a process which underlies global food and oxygen production. By determining if distinct plastid types have ribosomes that differ in both composition and function, the project could benefit biotechnological applications.
Regulation and role of metabolic networks for respiration in plants. This project aims to understand the regulation of respiration in plants which underpins the energy provision that cells need to operate. Understanding respiration and how it responds to the changing environment is a building block needed for rational engineering of our future food from plants.
Smoke-derived karrikins reveal a new pathway for plant development. This project aims to investigate a recently discovered signalling system in plants that requires an unknown hormone to regulate seed germination and seedling growth. Burning vegetation produces karrikins that promote seed germination by signalling through a recently identified plant protein. Plants do not make karrikins and impairments to this protein results in increased seed dormancy and abnormal leaf growth, suggesting karrik ....Smoke-derived karrikins reveal a new pathway for plant development. This project aims to investigate a recently discovered signalling system in plants that requires an unknown hormone to regulate seed germination and seedling growth. Burning vegetation produces karrikins that promote seed germination by signalling through a recently identified plant protein. Plants do not make karrikins and impairments to this protein results in increased seed dormancy and abnormal leaf growth, suggesting karrikins mimic an unknown plant hormone that regulates these aspects of plant development. The project aims to identify this phytohormone and elucidate its biosynthetic pathway. The identification of this new plant growth regulator would be a major advance for plant science and may create new opportunities in restoration ecology, weed control and food production.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE130101760
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$374,000.00
Summary
Uncovering the roles of key ribonucleases critical for post-transcriptional control of chloroplast gene expression. Higher plant chloroplasts harbour key biological processes that are essential to life on earth. Deciphering the roles of important plastid-targeted ribonucleases, central to post-transcriptional ribonucleic acid (RNA) processing events, is crucial to elucidate the genetic elements required to engineer chloroplast metabolic pathways to enhance productive crop yields.
Characterizing the regulators of mitochondrial biogenesis in Arabidopsis thaliana. The overall aim of this project is to identify and characterise the underlying regulatory factors that control mitochondrial mass and number in plants. The project will exploit a regulatory mechanism that links the mitochondrial import machinery and the respiratory chain. Utilising both forward and reverse genetic approaches, the abundances of protein import translocases will be altered and the changes to mitochon ....Characterizing the regulators of mitochondrial biogenesis in Arabidopsis thaliana. The overall aim of this project is to identify and characterise the underlying regulatory factors that control mitochondrial mass and number in plants. The project will exploit a regulatory mechanism that links the mitochondrial import machinery and the respiratory chain. Utilising both forward and reverse genetic approaches, the abundances of protein import translocases will be altered and the changes to mitochondrial biogenesis will be investigated. This will identify regulatory factors, which can be manipulated and used to alter mitochondrial number and activity.Read moreRead less