This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).
This Major Research Instrumentation-Recovery and Reinvestment (MRI-R2) award funds a set of plant growth chambers for Wilkes University. The chambers can be set for different temperatures, humidity, photoperiods and CO2 levels, and will have a direct impact on the research of faculty and will also see extensive use in several courses. The chambers will support research in screening Arabidopsis mutants with DNA insertions in non-coding RNAs recently identified by high-throughput sequencing. The ability to screen for altered responses to temperature, photoperiod, CO2 or other factors in parallel rather than in series will greatly speed the research. Other studies will focus on both rare native and invasive plant species, as well as revegetation of abandoned minelands, so the ability to evaluate the effects of altered temperature and other environmental factors on these species will greatly enhance the studies. The ability to compare the growth of plants under a variety of conditions will also enhance several courses, including the second semester of introductory biology and upper-levels including plant physiology, plant form and function, and ecology. It will also enhance the opportunities for independent and senior research projects. The ability to conduct more sophisticated plant research in sub-disciplines ranging from molecular biology to physiology and ecology will improve the training of Wilkes students and enhance the appeal of plant biology to the Wilkes student body. Acquisition of this equipment will also enhance interest in plant biology at the local community college and strengthen the collaboration with this college to recruit minority students into the program by providing them with opportunities to participate in workshops and research at Wilkes. Finally, it will enhance interest in plant biology in local high schools, since Wilkes has outreach programs with local high schools, some of which provide opportunity for students to be directly involved in research projects at the University. Data produced from these activities will be disseminated through peer-reviewed journal publications, and by student and faculty presentations at regional and national meetings.
The plant growth chambers acquired using this grant enhanced research and teaching at Wilkes University in several ways. They were used to study why reclamation of local sites that were strip-mined isn’t progressing as hoped and to come up with proposed solutions. They were also used study how global warming might affect arctic plants, and found that photosynthesis by arctic plants might indeed be harmed by increased temperature. In addition, they were used to study production of resveratrol, the chemical in red wine that is proposed to prolong life, by the invasive plant Japanese knotweed to see whether it might be a commercial source of resveratrol. We have not been able to determine whether it could be a commercial source of resveratrol, but we have learned a lot about when and where the plants make it and how they modify it. Finally, the chambers have been used to study the roles of a new class of RNA molecules, and have shown that when plants can’t make some of these molecules they grow poorly. The chambers have also been used in three different courses. Two of these courses took the novel approach of picking a research question related to the effects of climate change on plants and then learning about relevant topics in plant biology in the context of the current status of the project. Students reacted very positively to this approach, and claimed that they learned more and retained it better when it was directly relevant to a research project. Finally, the chambers have been used for two types of outreach activities. The first, aimed at twenty-five 12-13 year old girls, had them compare growth, development and expression of specific genes involved in photosynthesis by plants grown in current CO2 levels and the level projected for 2100. The results were quite dramatic, and showed how increasing CO2 will affect plants regardless of its effect on temperature. The second for 250 fifth- graders, demonstrated how elevated CO2 affects plant growth.
