The molecular basis of conductive and vascular tissue development in plants

PIPELINES aims to identify conserved molecular regulators of vascular and conductive tissue development in plants using single-cell transcriptomics to enhance crop biomass and productivity.

Subsidie
€ 1.999.699
2023

Projectdetails

Introduction

Plants contribute up to 80% of all biomass on earth. Despite their staggering diversity, dominant land plants share a highly important characteristic: the presence of a vascular system providing physical support and long-distance transport. This is, however, not a simple binary trait, as some non-vascular mosses contain cells with conductive capacity resembling that of vascular plants.

Conductive Tissues

Available evidence indeed suggests that conductive tissues of non-vascular plants are functionally homologous to vascular tissues in vascular plants and can even be compared at a molecular level. However, the molecular players involved in conductive tissue development remain almost completely unknown.

Molecular Regulators

Moreover, although key molecular regulators of vascular tissue development have been identified in the model plant Arabidopsis, very few are shown to be functionally conserved across vascular plants. Despite their importance for growth and development, we thus have a limited understanding of the evolutionary conserved regulators of plant plumbing systems.

Project Overview

In PIPELINES, I will consolidate my expertise in single-cell applications and build a dedicated team to identify conserved molecular players specific to vascular and conductive tissues. This will be achieved by:

  1. Combining multi-species comparative single-cell and spatial transcriptomics with gene regulatory network inference.
  2. Characterizing these factors using loss-of-function approaches.

By comparing this data, I will determine the ancestral set of regulators sufficient to trigger specification and differentiation events in plants. Additionally, I will validate these through the introduction of single-cell sample multiplexing in a heterologous system.

Expected Outcomes

By unraveling the molecular basis of vascular and conductive tissue development and identifying conserved core developmental regulators, the output of PIPELINES will act as a starting point for targeted engineering of vascular tissues. This holds great potential for improving plant biomass and productivity in crop species.

Financiële details & Tijdlijn

Financiële details

Subsidiebedrag€ 1.999.699
Totale projectbegroting€ 1.999.699

Tijdlijn

Startdatum1-3-2023
Einddatum29-2-2028
Subsidiejaar2023

Partners & Locaties

Projectpartners

  • VIB VZWpenvoerder

Land(en)

Belgium

Vergelijkbare projecten binnen European Research Council

ERC Starting...

Resolving the mechanism of plant cell expansion at high spatio-temporal resolution.

This project aims to use advanced optical nanoscopy and biosensors to investigate cell wall remodeling in plants, enhancing understanding of growth mechanisms and their implications for broader biological processes.

€ 2.029.368
ERC Consolid...

Dissecting the role of rapid auxin responses in plant morphogenesis

The MORpH project aims to uncover the role of rapid auxin signaling in regulating cell wall pH and plant morphogenesis, using genetic and imaging techniques in Arabidopsis and Brachypodium distachyon.

€ 1.999.660
ERC Advanced...

Cyclic nucleotides as second messengers in plants

This project aims to establish cAMP and cGMP as key second messengers in plant signaling by developing optogenetic tools to manipulate their levels and explore their roles in various pathways.

€ 2.499.706
ERC Synergy ...

DISCOVERING HOW PLANTS SENSE WATER STRESS

This project aims to uncover how plants sense water availability using innovative genetic and imaging techniques to enhance climate-resilient crop design for global food security.

€ 9.780.769
ERC Starting...

Plants as a window on emergent memory and computation in dynamical distributed multicellular systems

This project investigates how plants use stochastic hormone transport for sensory information processing and movement control, aiming to uncover principles of distributed computation in biological systems.

€ 1.500.000