The Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory course on Molecular Techniques in Plant Science is a highly competitive advanced laboratory short course covering a wide variety of plant systems, reflecting current research priorities in many US plant laboratories. The course allows students to take advantage of a wealth of technological resources applied to biological processes that are unique to plants. It fulfills a continuing demand within the plant science community for training in molecular and genetic approaches. The course teaches state of the art techniques to scientists already involved in plant research, and introduces scientists familiar with microbial or animal systems to cutting-edge plant research. The course includes a lecture series, a hands-on laboratory, and informal workshops. The instructors are chosen on the basis of their contributions to and knowledge of the fields covered in the course. The laboratory sessions provide intensive training in modern techniques in plant biology and reinforce the lessons learned in lectures. The broader impact of the course is the training of researchers in the most recent findings and techniques in plant biology. The students are chosen to include those who will disseminate information acquired in the course most broadly. Many of the students who take the course go on to lead their own laboratories and the course provides a foundation of knowledge for these new lab heads. Students come from a variety of backgrounds and are exposed to multiple approaches during the course increasing their chance of conducting interdisciplinary research that is so vital for scientific progress.
INSTRUCTORS: Harmer, Stacey, University of California, Davis, California Last, Robert, Michigan State University, E. Lansing, Michigan Maloof, Julin, University of California, Davis, California ASSISTANTS: Ellison, Cory, University of California, Davis, California Gaurav, Moghe, Michigan State University, E. Lansing, Michigan Schilmiller, Anthony, Michigan State University, E. Lansing, Michigan Schrager, Amanda, University of California, Davis, California This course provides an intensive overview of topics in plant physiology, biochemistry and development, focusing on molecular genetic and analytical approaches to understanding plant biology. It emphasizes recent results from Arabidopsis, maize and a variety of other plants and provides an introduction to current methods used in plant molecular biology. It is designed for scientists with some experience in molecular techniques or in plant biology who wish to work with plants using the latest technologies in genetics, molecular biology and biochemistry. The course consists of a vigorous lecture series, a hands-on laboratory, and informal discussions. Discussions of important topics in plant research will be presented by the instructors and by invited speakers. These seminars will include plant morphology and anatomy; plant development (such as development of flowers, leaves, male and female gametophytes, and roots); perception of light and photomorphogenesis; cell wall biosynthesis, function and perception of hormones and application of research results to addressing current agronomic problems. Lectures describing bioinformatics tools available to the plant community, and the resources provided by plant genome projects are also included. Speakers will provide overviews of their fields, followed by in-depth discussions of their own work. The laboratory sessions will provide an introduction to important techniques currently used in plant research. These include studies of plant development, mutant analysis, histochemical staining, transient gene expression, gene silencing, applications of fluorescent protein fusions, protein interaction and detection, proteomics approaches, several different approaches for quantifying metabolites, transient transformation and techniques commonly used in genetic and physical mapping. The course also includes several short workshops on important themes in plant research. This course is supported with funds provided by the National Science Foundation
