Plants provide us with food, feed, fiber, medicines, fuel and other bioproducts, and in so doing sequester carbon dioxide, create habitat, stabilize landscapes and encompass an extraordinary biodiversity. Both environmental preservation and human uses of plants require knowledge of plant form and function, from the molecular to ecosystem perspectives, and spanning single-celled, aquatic organisms to domesticated agricultural species and their wild relatives, to the tallest trees. Plant research underpinned the Green Revolution, and is now being called upon to address a range of challenges in food, health and the environment. Because of the breadth of plant science and its associated experimental technologies, the field faces significant headwinds to address multilateral, multidisciplinary experimental questions. This project will form the Coordinated Plant Science Research and Education Network, a network of research and education societies with involvement in plant science research that continues and amplifies a successful effort to unite a broad spectrum of plant scientists around a strategic plan called the Decadal Vision that was published in 2013. The Network has two major goals: (1) to catalyze interdisciplinary training and research by encouraging and facilitating information exchange among its six founding member societies, a number intended to grow; and (2) to use dedicated workshops to seek novel solutions to broaden participation in plant sciences, and to re-examine how postdoctoral fellows should be trained in the plant sciences. Improved cross-talk between different stripes of experimental plant scientists, and with those contributing enabling technologies from imaging to robotics to informatics, promises to enrich and enliven the plant community, while leading to exciting and empowering fundamental discoveries about the wonders of plants.
By serving as a forum through which plant science constituencies coordinate their efforts to advance plant science research, education, and innovation, the Coordinated Plant Science Research and Education Network will coordinate and facilitate a successful effort by the broader plant community to establish a consensus-driven set of priorities which culminated in the 2013 publication of "Unleashing a Decade of Innovation in Plant Science: A vision for 2015-2025". The founding members of the Network are the American Society of Plant Biologists, the Alliance of Crop, Soil and Environmental Science Societies, the American Phytopathological Society, the American Society for Horticultural Science, the Botanical Society of America, the Genetics Society of America, and the Council on Undergraduate Research. The Network will be open to any interested scientific professional associations and will proactively engage other organizations with an interest in the study of plants. One of the main goals of the Network is to serve as a clearinghouse for the research, education and outreach activities and opportunities for its members and the wider plant science community. Expected outcomes include new collaborations among societies and scientists, including new interdisciplinary collaborative research projects that will advance the frontiers of plant sciences, and innovative recruitment and training strategies for the next generation of scientists required for excellence in U.S. plant science research. The Network will also convene two workshops, on broadening participation and postdoctoral training that aim to catalyze career building and diversification within the plant science workforce. To communicate the wonder and importance of plant research, the Network will develop a shared set of consistent messages to the public, including authoritative, science-based information on key societally relevant topics. Internal and external communication for the Network will be through Plantae.org, a modular web interface custom designed to serve the needs of the Network and members of the broader plant science community.
