Senescence of whole plants and of plant organs os moderately well understood physiologically. The PI will begin a nine-month program away from the home institution with a three- month internship at a leading center for physiological and ecological research (Carnegie Institute of Washington and Stanford University"s Department of Biological Sciences), learning senescence physiology, measuring nitrogen movement within and out of senescing plants, and investigating the consequences of two kinds of experimentally induced leaf senescence on plant productivity. The short-term productivity measurements will expose the PI to current techniques for measuring light, photosynthesis, and respiration. Next, the PI will spend six months at a field station in Costa Rica, where the Pi will use the knowledge and techniques acquired at Carnegie to conduct field experiments. The target organisms will be evergreen perennial, a group of plants that is crucial to the design of sustainable agricultural systems and to the understanding of tropical forest dynamics. If successful, this research will enable scientists to accelerate or delay plant senescence by manipulating light and soul nutrients.
