CoPIs: Julie Angle (Oklahoma State University - Stillwater), George Chuck (University of California - Berkeley), Jennifer Hawkins (West Virginia University - Morgantown), and Clint Whipple (Brigham Young University - Provo)
Tillers are axillary branches that are initiated at the base of the grass plant and that create the characteristic tufted form of most grasses. They play important roles in grain yield and biomass accumulation, and understanding the genetic signals that regulate the number, size and fertility of tillers is of critical importance for optimizing yield potential in the world's major food, animal feed and biofuel grass crops. In addition, the initiation of tillers is important for perenniality in many grasses, and as such, full knowledge of the tillering pathway will contribute to the development of perennial biofuel and grain crops. The panicoid grasses are immensely important for all of these uses, and the full suite of genes that comprise the tillering pathway and the components that have been selected during domestication are largely unknown. This project exploits evolutionary variation and changes during domestication in three panicoid cereals (maize, sorghum and foxtail millet) and their wild, highly tillered ancestors to uncover the genetic regulation and evolutionary modification of tillering. Forward and reverse genetic approaches and transcriptomic analysis in both ancestral and domesticated backgrounds will provide insight into the gene networks necessary for growth and development of tillers in panicoid grasses. It is anticipated that the results from this comparative project will extend to and inform experiments across a wide range of agronomically important taxa.
In addition to training postdoctoral associates and graduate and undergraduate students, this project aims to immerse high school science teachers from rural schools and from areas serving high proportions of underrepresented student populations in a research environment that will be combined with professional development activities. This immersion experience will help educators gain an explicit view of how scientific knowledge is generated and will assist with their own curriculum development. They will implement this new content knowledge and pedagogical skills into their existing curriculum, mentoring students and preservice teachers in student research projects, and coaching students in science fair competitions. Scientific findings and educational outreach experiences will be shared at science and education conferences and through publication in scientific and practitioner journals. All data produced in this project will be accessible through a project website (http://tillering.okstate.edu) and long-term through public repositories including GenBank, Gramene, MaizeGDB and PLEXdb. Curriculum materials and lesson plans will be made available as they are produced at http://tillering.okstate.edu. Germplasm resources will be available upon request or through the Maize Genetics Cooperation Stock Center (http://maizecoop.cropsci.uiuc.edu).
