shunhong dai, ph.d. assistant research member
sdai@danforthcenter.org
Infection of viral pathogens often causes perturbed expression of genes important to plant growth and development and leads to diseases. Tungro disease is one of the most important viral diseases in rice. Inter- actions between tungro viruses and key host transcriptional regulators identified by our research are involved in the disease development. We are dissecting the regulatory pathways of those host factors, which will provide more insights into tungro disease and generate new tools for fighting this devastating disease.
Signaling pathways modulating plant responses to environment are often integrated into networks. Circadian rhythm is emerging as one of the integrators of signaling pathways. We are exploring the potential involvement of a clock gene that we recently identified in stress re- sponses including biotic and abiotic stress.
recent publications: Shunhong Dai, Roger N. Beachy (2009) Genetic engineering of rice to resist rice tungro disease. In Vitro Cellular & Developmental Biology - Plant 45:517- 524
Shunhong Dai, Xiaoping Wei, Antonio A. Alfonso, Liping Pei, Ulysses G. Duque, Zhihong Zhang, Gina M. Babb, Roger N. Beachy (2008) Transgenic rice plants that over-express transcription factors RF2a and RF2b are tolerant to rice tungro virus replication and disease. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 105(52): 21012-21016.
tahzeeba hossain, ph.d. assistant research member
thossain@danforthcenter.org
Folate is a collective term for a group of B vitamins essential in one- carbon metabolism of almost all living organisms. Folate deficiency has been linked to neural tube defects, megaloblastic anemia, impaired cognitive development, cancer and cardiovascular disease. Folates are a dietary requirement for humans and animals because they are unable to synthesize this vitamin. Plants and certain microbes can synthesize folate de novo and are major sources of folate for humans. Staple crops such as rice, wheat, maize, various tubers and root tuber crops are extremely low in folate. Te primary research focus of our laboratory is to identify different factors affecting/regulating the de novo folate
synthesis pathway in plants. Our research goal is to apply the knowl- edge gained from the de novo folate pathway study for biofortification of staple crops low in folate nutritional value. Using a bacterial enzyme responsible for catalyzing the first committed step of the de novo pathway we increased folate content 2–4 fold in the laboratory model plant, Arabidopsis thaliana. We also determined a second rate limiting step of the de novo folate pathway in plants. Utilizing these results from the folate de novo pathway study we are currently working on overexpression of genes involved in the rate limiting steps to increase the folate content in sweetpotato.
recent publications:
T. Hossain and K. R. Schubert (2007). Metabolic Engineering of Folate Biosynthesis in Plants: Expression of Bacterial GTP Cyclohydrolase 1 in Arabi- dopsis thaliana Results in Increased Pteridine and Folate Levels. In Gerrit Jansen and Godefridus J. Peters (Eds.), Chemistry and Biology of Pteridines and Folates (pp 584-607). Heilbronn: SPS Publication.
2009 scientific report the donald danforth plant science center
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