This research aims to enable gene function studies in hornworts (Anthocerophyta), a distinct lineage of bryophytes. Outcomes from this work will facilitate investigating the exceptional ways hornworts fix nitrogen through symbiosis with cyanobacteria and fix carbon using a specialized carbon-concentrating mechanism (CCM). Hornworts are also critical for understanding major transitions in plant evolution because they represent a critical step in the formation of land plants and have a set of unique developmental features. The genetic transformation and gene-editing tools developed in this study will be disseminated broadly and rapidly to the scientific community. A symposium and a workshop will be held to build a thriving hornwort community and provide hands-on experiences on hornwort research tools. In addition, through the Boyce Thompson Institute Summer Internship program, three undergraduate students will be mentored. The interns will be able to take advantage of the integrative nature of this project, and learn plant tissue culture, wet lab experiments, and bioinformatics. Finally, by enabling genetic research to investigate hornworts? unique cyanobacteria symbiosis and CCM, this project could have agricultural implications to improve nitrogen and carbon assimilation in crop plants.
Despite having the potential to address a diversity of long-standing questions in biology, research on hornworts has been limited by a lack of genetic tools. Past research using RNA-sequencing and comparative genomics has identified several candidate genes involved in cyanobacteria symbiosis and CCM, but further investigation of these candidates is limited by the lack of a reverse genetic toolkit. Gene transfer or transformation in hornworts has been demonstrated, but the efficiency is very low and results are inconsistent. The goal of this project is to establish robust transformation and gene editing methodologies in the hornwort Anthoceros agrestis. Enabling genetic research in hornworts will not only complement the other two bryophyte models (the moss Physcomitrella patens and the liverwort Marchantia polymorpha) but will also provide unprecedented opportunities to study a unique plant with unparalleled biological properties. A wide range of scientific communities will benefit, including researchers working on plant evolution, developmental genetics, paleobiology, photobiology, plant-microbe interaction, and photosynthesis.
This award is co-funded by the Enabling Discovery through GEnomic tools (EDGE) Program and the Plant Genome Research Program (PGRP) in the Division of Integrated Organismal Systems
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
