Significant advances in digital imaging technology provide capabilities not otherwise available. The overall objective of this proposal is to obtain a 16-bit/pixel digital imager that will permit investigators in the Plant Sciences Building at The University of Georgia to profit from this technology. A single instrument that will provide images of media labelled with both radioisotopic and non-radioisotopic probes is requested. Supporting items include a microcomputer essential for operation of the imager, one high energy phosphor screen cassette for each major user, one low-energy phosphor screen cassette to be shared among all users, four chemiluminescence screen cassettes to be shared among all users, a grey-scale laser printer for routine and inexpensive output, and site-licensed image-analysis software. All will be integrated into an existing computer network that will not only permit data to be moved readily from the imager to each user s laboratory, but will also provide direct access to a publication quality color printer and to a CD recorder for archiving data. The imaging system (1) will permit us to obtain quantitative information with greatly enhanced sensitivity and accuracy, and (2) will dramatically decrease exposure times, permitting experiments to progress at a much more rapid pace. Current usage of film for imaging media in the Plant Sciences Building exceeds 4,700/year, indicating that a digital imager will receive extensive and efficient use. The instrument will be used primarily with DNA, RNA and protein blots, labelled with 32p, 1251, 35S, 14C, or with enzymes that yield chemiluminescence given appropriate substrates. Research programs that will benefit from the equipment range from mission-oriented (e.g., H. Roger Boerma) to fundamental (e.g., Kelly Dawe). These programs include the regulation of virulence genes in a plant pathogen (Timothy Denny), intercellular movement of plant viruses and intracellular movement of viral glycop roteins (C. Michael Deom), characterization of root-knot nematode secretions (Richard Hussey and Celeste Ray), genetic improvement of pest resistance and stress tolerance in soybean (H. Roger Boerma), use of molecular markers in plant breeding and evolution (Gary Kochert), characterization of two pathways of polyamine synthesis in plants (Russell Malmberg), the genetics and cell biology of the maize meiotic centromere and kinetochore (Kelly Dawe), and a comparative evaluation of the phytochrome gene family and its expression in tomato and soghum (Lee Pratt and Marie-Michele Cordonnier-Pratt).
