This action funds an NSF National Plant Genome Initiative Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2014. The fellowship supports a research and training plan in a host laboratory for the Fellow who also presents a plan to broaden participation in biology. The title of the research and training plan for this fellowship to Dana M. Freund is "A Systems Biology Approach to Understanding Lysine Acetylation in the Regulation of Plant Metabolism and the Effects of Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide" The host institution for the fellowship is the University of Minnesota and the sponsoring scientists are Drs. Adrian D. Hegeman and Jerry D. Cohen.
The research will look at how plants respond to environmental changes which will lead to knowledge that can be used to engineer plants for the future. Training objectives include plant biochemistry, stable isotope labeling techniques, protein turnover and metabolic flux analysis. Broader impacts include workshops hosted by mentors on metabolomics and training of graduate and undergraduate students. The knowledge gained will increase the understanding of how altered levels of carbon dioxide will affect plants in the future and how plants modulate responses to environmental variables, such as atmospheric carbon dioxide.
Understanding at a molecular level how plants deal with climate variability, especially changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, will contribute to the ability to engineer plants that are able to be productive in the future. One aspect to consider is lysine acetylation, a readily reversible modification that alters protein function and regulates metabolism. This research will investigate the regulation of lysine acetylation at the level of removal and the resulting metabolic changes. Atmospheric carbon dioxide levels directly influence important plant metabolic processes such as photosynthesis and photorespiration. Proteins and metabolites will be measured at various levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Connections between protein stability, lysine acetylation, and metabolite flux information will explain the role of acetylation as modulated by changes in environmental carbon dioxide levels.
