Regulation of Assimilatory Nitrate Reductase: Dr. Solomonson proposes to elucidate the regulatory mechanisms operative in the regulation of nitrate assimilation. This is the process by which plants convert nitrate in soil to usable organic nitrogen. In an algal model system he will use molecular and biochemical techniques to learn how cellular activity is affected by light intensity, concentrations of oxygen, carbon dioxide, nitrate and fixed nitrogens. Nitrate reductase is the key enzyme in nitrate assimilation, the major process responsible for the conversion of inorganic nitrogen of soil and fertilizer to organic nitrogen in the plant kingdom. The net global production of food protein is eventually dependent in large part on nitrate assimilation. Understanding how nitrate reductase is regulated in the green alga, Chlorella, will certainly increase our knowledge of how this enzyme is regulated throughout the plant kingdom. Thus the results of this study will not only be of fundamental importance but may also in the future be agronomically significant.
