Abstract DBI 9750329 Lorraine G. van Waasbergen This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biosciences Related to the Environment for 1997. This fellowship provides an opportunity for the Fellow to gain additional scientific training beyond the doctoral degree and to pursue innovative and imaginative into the fundamental mechanisms underlying the interactions between organisms and their environment at the molecular, cellular, organismal, population, community and/or ecosystem level in any area of biology supported by the Directorate for Biological Sciences of the National Science Foundation. Each fellowship supports a research and training plan to be carried out in a sponsoring laboratory. The research and training plan for this fellowship is entitled "Cyanobacteria as a model system for light perception in plants." Blue/UV- A light controls numerous aspects of plant growth. High intensity white light causes oxidative photodamage in plants. Both types of light activate some important plant genes suggesting that the cellular perception of these signals is interconnected. This research uses a recently discovered gene, hliA, in cyanobacteria that is induced in response to both high light and blue light. Cyanobacteria, the blue-green algae, are serving as a model for higher plants to identify components of the signal transduction pathways involved in sensing and control of gene expression by various plant pigments. If possible, a blue light receptor will be identified.
