đ» TWiB April 11, 2022
It's been a busy week here, and it might be about to get busier. Botany One has switched from one webserver to a different host - which took longer to sort out than I anticipated.
Next week is going to be taken u with some trips to the doctor and some time off, so next week's email might be a be shorter or later than usual. Until then, take care,
Alun (webmaster@botany.one)
In Botany One
Tips on how to apply for a science editor post at Botany One â botany.one We've examined where people struggled with applications, the last time we had an editor post open. Here are some tips for what we are looking for.
Increased nutrients could help subarctic shrubs mitigate some of the stresses from a warmer environment â botany.one A Scandinavian team have examined how climate change will affect nutrient availability for shrubs and found a surprising result.
News & Views
The easyclimate R package: easy access to high-resolution daily climate data for Europe
Cruz-Alonso and colleagues present easyclimate, a software package to obtain daily climatic data at high resolution (0.0083Âș, ~1 km) with R. The package facilitates the downloading and processing of precipitation, minimum and maximum temperatures for Europe from 1950 to 2020. Using easyclimate and given a set of coordinates (points or polygons) and dates (days or years), the user can download the climatic information as a tidy table or a raster object.
Shunning the scoop: Sidestepping the race to publish What happens when a researcher finds out that research very similar to their own is already being conducted? What if they find out that the said research is also very close to being published? First, there is probably anxiety and panic. Maybe, there are frantic calls to collaborators. Perhaps Twitter rants about the phenomenon of scooping that plagues all researchers, especially those early-career researchers who often feel they are in a race to get their best work out to the world.
Defeating late blight disease of potato in sub-Saharan Africa â www.openaccessgovernment.org Three academic experts, including Richard E. Goodman from the Food Allergy Research and Resource Program, shed light on defeating late blight disease of potato in sub-Saharan Africa, starting with a brief introduction to the crop in question
Free computational labs for an undergraduate/graduate community ecology class â benjaminblonder.org Do you teach community ecology or are you hoping to learn more about it? Iâve just released a set of 9 computational labs (plus solutions) that I have historically used to teach population and community ecology. They involve learning modern tidyverse R plus various data manipulation techniques, and also enable students to engage with numerous complex datasets.
Global team of scientists determine 'fingerprint' for how much heat, drought is too much for forests â phys.org How hot is too hot, and how dry is too dry, for the Earth's forests? A new study from an international team of researchers found the answersâby looking at decades of dying trees.
Many of These Plants Older Than Dinosaurs Face Extinction â www.smithsonianmag.com Cycads have changed a great deal since they first appeared around 280 million years ago, and habitat loss and illegal trade are now threats
The first two Botany360 event recordings are online. Ace It! - Write a Better Title and Ace It! - Write a Better Abstract .
Time to recognize authorship of open data â www.nature.com The open data revolution wonât happen unless the research system values the sharing of data as much as authorship on papers.
Scientific Papers
Plant volatiles as regulators of hormone homeostasis Some canonical plant hormones such as auxins and gibberellins have precursors that are biogenic volatiles (indole, indole acetonitrile, phenylacetaldoxime and ent-kaurene). Cytokinins, abscisic acid and strigolactones are hormones comprising chemical moieties that have distinct volatile analogues, and are synthesised alongside constitutively emitted volatiles (isoprene, sesquiterpenes, lactones, benzenoids and apocarotenoid volatiles). Nonvolatile hormone analogues and biogenic volatile organic compounds (BVOCs) evolved in tandem as growth and behavioural regulators in unicellular organisms. In plants, however, nonvolatile hormones evolved as regulators of growth, development and differentiation, while endogenous BVOCs (often synthesised lifelong) became subtle regulators of hormone synthesis, availability, activity and turnover, all supported by functionally redundant components of hormone metabolism.
Epigenetics: a catalyst of plant immunity against pathogens
This review outlines the mechanisms by which epigenetic responses to pathogen infection shape the plant immune system across expanding time scales. Hannan Parker et al. review the cis- and trans-acting mechanisms by which stress-inducible epigenetic changes at transposable elements (TEs) regulate genome-wide defence gene expression and draw particular attention to one regulatory model that is supported by recent evidence about the function of AGO1 and H2A.Z in transcriptional control of defence genes.
Jasmonic acid (JA) is a key regulator of plants defense responses. Although the transcription factor MYC2, the master regulator of the JA signaling pathway, orchestrates a hierarchical transcriptional cascade that regulates the JA responses, only a few transcriptional regulators involved in this cascade have been described. Cao et al. identified the basic helix-loop-helix (bHLH) transcription factor gene in tomato (Solanum lycopersicum), METHYL JASMONATE (MeJA)-INDUCED GENE (SlJIG), whose expression was strongly induced by MeJA treatment. Genetic and molecular biology experiments revealed that SlJIG is a direct target of MYC2.
Spikelets are the fundamental building blocks of Poaceae inflorescences, and their development and branching patterns determine the various inflorescence architectures and grain yield of grasses. In wheat (Triticum aestivum), the central spikelets produce the most and largest grains, while spikelet size gradually decreases acro- and basipetally, giving rise to the characteristic lanceolate shape of wheat spikes. The acropetal gradient corresponds with the developmental age of spikelets; however, the basal spikelets are developed first, and the cause of their small size and rudimentary development is unclear. Backhaus et al. adapted G&T-seq, a low-input transcriptomics approach, to characterize gene expression profiles within spatial sections of individual spikes before and after the establishment of the lanceolate shape
Plant responses to multifactorial stress combination
Zandalinas ad Mittler highlight the new concept of multifactorial stress combination and discuss its importance for our efforts to develop climate change-resilient crops.
Cytokinin promotes growth cessation in the Arabidopsis root
By using time-lapse imaging, genetics, and computational analysis, Liu et al. analyze the effect of cytokinin on root zonation and cellular growth. They found that cytokinin promotes growth cessation in the distal (shootward) elongation zone in conjunction with accelerating the transition from elongation to differentiation.
AgroLux: bioluminescent Agrobacterium to improve molecular pharming and study plant immunity
Agroinfiltration in Nicotiana benthamiana is widely used to transiently express heterologous proteins in plants. However, the state of Agrobacterium itself is not well studied in agroinfiltrated tissues, despite frequent studies of immunity genes conducted through agroinfiltration. Jutras et al. generated a bioluminescent strain of Agrobacterium tumefaciens GV3101 to monitor the luminescence of Agrobacterium during agroinfiltration. By integrating a single copy of the lux operon into the genome, we generated a stable âAgroLuxâ strain, which is bioluminescent without affecting Agrobacterium growth inâvitro and inâplanta.
Biogeography of global drylands
Despite their extent and socio-ecological importance, a comprehensive biogeographical synthesis of drylands is lacking. Maestre et al. synthesize the biogeography of key organisms (vascular and nonvascular vegetation and soil microorganisms), attributes (functional traits, spatial patterns, plantâplant and plantâsoil interactions) and processes (productivity and land cover) across global drylands.
Fire-released seed dormancy - a global synthesis
Seed dormancy varies greatly between species, clades, communities, and regions. We propose that fireprone ecosystems create ideal conditions for the selection of seed dormancy as fire provides a mechanism for dormancy release and postfire conditions are optimal for germination. Thus, fire-released seed dormancy should vary in type and abundance under different fire regimes. To test these predictions, Pausas and Lamont compiled data from a wide range of fire-related germination experiments for species in different ecosystems across the globe.
Autophagy promotes programmed cell death and corpse clearance in specific cell types of the Arabidopsis root cap â www.sciencedirect.com
Autophagy is a conserved quality control pathway that mediates the degradation of cellular components by targeting them to the lysosomes or vacuoles. Autophagy has been implicated in the regulation of some regulated cell death processes in animal systems. However, its function in developmentally controlled programmed cell death (dPCD) in plants remains little studied and controversial.
Global field observations of tree die-off reveal hotter-drought fingerprint for Earthâs forests â www.nature.com
Hammond et al. established a geo-referenced global database documenting climate-induced mortality events spanning all tree-supporting biomes and continents, from 154 peer-reviewed studies since 1970. Their analysis quantifies a global âhotter-drought fingerprintâ from these tree-mortality sitesâeffectively a hotter and drier climate signal for tree mortalityâacross 675 locations encompassing 1,303 plots.
TaCol-B5 modifies spike architecture and enhances grain yield in wheat
In wheat, the numbers of tillers, spikes, and spikelets determine how much grain is produced. Beginning with a cross between two common wheat cultivars, Zhang et al. cloned a gene that affects wheat plant architecture and, consequently, grain yield.
Macroevolutionary dynamics in the transition of angiosperms to aquatic environments
Angiosperm lineages in aquatic environments are characterized by high structural and functional diversity, and wide distributions. A long-standing evolutionary riddle is what processes have caused the relatively low diversity of aquatic angiosperms compared to their terrestrial relatives. Meseguer et al. use diversification and ancestral reconstruction models with a comprehensive >â10â000 genus angiosperm phylogeny to elucidate the macroevolutionary dynamics associated with transitions of terrestrial plants to water.
Elastic and collapsible: current understanding of cell walls in succulent plants â academic.oup.com
Fradera-Soler et al. summarize current knowledge of cell walls in drought-avoiding succulents and their effects on tissue biomechanics, water relations, and photosynthesis. They also highlight the existing knowledge gaps and propose a hypothetical model for regulated cell wall folding in succulent tissues upon dehydration.
Careers
Associate or Senior Editor, Nature Communications (Plant Biology) (42012) Do you love science but feel that a career at the bench isnât enough to sate your desire to learn more about the natural world? Do you enjoy reading papers outside your chosen area of research? If the answer is âyesâ to any or all of these questions, you could be the person weâre looking for to join the editorial team of Nature Communications.
Post-doc position in Plant Sciences : Analysis of stress epigenetic memory in perennials
A 18 months position supported by Bordeaux Plant Sciences (BPS) research program is available in UMR Ecophysiology and Grape Functional Genomics (EGFV) and in UMR Biodiversity, Genes and Communities (BIOGECO) in Bordeaux, France. The successful candidate will be integrated into the Tepimemory project, which focuses on short and long term epigenetic memory induced by abiotic stress.
Postdoctoral Researcher in Plant Protein Contaminants As a researcher with a PhD, do you want to apply your passion for food microbiology to safely design plant-based foods? We are looking for an ambitious Postdoctoral researcher with a great interest in quantitative microbiology. Our project aims to predict behaviour of microbial contaminants in plant-based foods to reduce food waste and ensure food safety, contributing to more sustainable foods. It is part of a large consortium project, involving multiple industrial and knowledge partners, that is funded by Top Sector Agri&Food.
Two Postdoctoral Positions, at the Department of Forest Genetics and Plant Physiology
Ambient temperature above or below a threshold can adversely affect plant growth and development, and even lead to death. The tightly regulated distribution of the hormone auxin throughout the plant body controls an impressive variety of developmental processes that tailor plant growth and morphology to environmental conditions. Although non-optimal ambient temperature can alter auxin transport, the precise nature of this alteration and the underlying molecular mechanisms remain enigmatic. The aim of the project is to dissect the molecular mechanisms involved in auxin transport and its downstream signaling upon temperature stress, focusing on the root of the model organism Arabidopsis thaliana. The project will combine state-of-the-art approaches, e.g. various microscopy techniques, molecular and cell biology, biochemistry.
Postdoctoral Fellow / Research Fellow The Postdoctoral / Research Fellow will join the Canberra molecular Physiology team of the international C4 Rice Consortium funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The aim of the consortium is to install the C4 photosynthetic pathway into rice using synthetic biology and plant genetic transformation. The project seeks to install key genes which control anatomical and biochemical specialisation required for the operation of the C4 pathway by overexpression in rice.
Assistant Professor, Metabolomics of Adaptive Responses The Department of Botany and Plant Sciences at The University of California, Riverside (UCR) invites applications for a tenure-track Assistant Professor position in metabolomics, focusing on cellular and physiological adaptive responses in plants, with an anticipated start date of July 1, 2022. It is part of a major initiative in metabolomics, as UCR seeks to hire additional faculty in this research area in the next few years. The successful candidate will build on UCR's current strengths in metabolomics and plant adaptive responses. The successful candidate will build a research program in an area such as: evolution of secondary metabolic pathways; medicinal plants; plant secondary metabolites and human health; or in an emerging research area such as microbiomes, eco-metabolomics, and quantitative metabolomic imaging and downstream analyses.
Curator of Palaeobotany As the successful candidate, you will be working within the Preservation and Research Section at the RTMP. The section spearheads world-class research, fossil preparation and preservation, collections management, and the administration of Palaeontological aspects of the Historical Resources Act, leading to an increased knowledge and appreciation of the Palaeontological history of Alberta and its importance in a global context.
Postdoctoral Fellow, Laboratory of Dr. Wolfgang Busch The ideal candidate will be a plant biologist who has expertise in phenotyping, genetics and plant molecular biology. Ideal candidates should be intellectually curious, highly productive, driven to uncover new and impactful biology and to apply this knowledge to the larger problem of climate change, and enjoy working in a committed and diverse team. The postdoc will join a vibrant group of molecular biologists, plant geneticists and computational biologists to work in a team that is determined to address a global problem with the power of plant biology.
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