Molecular and biochemical basis for plant stress tolerance and fruit quality
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abstract
The project will address two subjects.First, using a model plant Arabidopsis thaliana, function of complex N-glycans in plant osmotic stress tolerance will be studied.Osmotic stress is a continuing problem in modern agriculture. Osmotic stress imposed by low temperature, salinity, and water deficit significantly restrict land usage, and agricultural management against these problems imposes significant amount on total production costs.N-glycans are major modifications attached to proteins and we previously showed their importance in osmotic stress tolerance.Yet, how they execute their function under stress is still unclear.We developed a genetic system to identify genes that are expected to mediate CG function and termed themKSSgenes.In this study, we will identify and determine their roles in CG function and osmotic stress.The second subject is to identify genes responsible for volatile metabolites that affect stress response as well as fruit quality of melon plants.We will use profile gene expression in ripening fruits and combine gene expression and volatile production data to identify genes associated with specific metabolite profiles.Genome editing technology will be applied to modify volatile profiles, and fruit quality and stress response of the edited plants will be characterized.It is expected edited plants will produce volatiles more preferred by consumers, and their fitness to abiotic stress will be evaluated for potential development of commercial lines containing such genome modifications.
