研究领域

Mutation, Evolution and Environmental Response

The relationship with the environment is fundamental to the biology of all organisms, and especially to plants. Our research group investigates key aspects of this relationship, focusing on the ways in which environment changes plant biology over a wide range of timescales: from the short-term physiological adaptation of individual plants to fluctuating environments, to the long-term effects of environment on plant evolution. We also have particular interests in how plants coordinate the regulation of their growth with their acquisition of carbon and mineral nutrient resources from the environment. These particular interests arise from our previous world-leading work on the gibberellin-DELLA mechanism and our discovery of the mechanisms via which ‘green revolution’ crop varieties are altered in this coordination (see below). Our approaches are unified by the use of genetics, with a strong emphasis on whole-genome sequencing, and we use both model and crop plant systems (Arabidopsis thaliana, rice and wheat) appropriate to particular research questions. Our coordinated interests cover both fundamental questions (e.g., How does mutation contribute to plant evolution?) and practical outcomes (e.g., Can we improve the nutrient use efficiency (NUE) or soil-salinity tolerance of crop plants?). Specific interests are outlined below (see Current Projects).

近期论文

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An ancestral role for Constitutive Triple Response 1 (CTR1) proteins in both ethylene and abscisic acid signalling. Yuki Yasumura, Ronald Pierik, Steven Kelly, Masaaki Sakuta, Laurentius A. C. J. Voesenek and Nicholas P. Harberd (2015). Plant Physiology 169, 283-289. Overexpressing the multiple-stress responsive gene At1g74450 reduces plant height and male fertility in Arabidopsis thaliana. Anne M. Visscher, Eric J. Belfield, Daniela Vlad, Niloufer Irani, Ian Moore and Nicholas P. Harberd (2015). PLoS One 10.1371/journal.pone.0140368 Shaping taste: the molecular discovery of rice genes improving grain size, shape and quality. Nicholas P. Harberd (2015). Journal of Genetics and Genomics 42, 597-599. Shoot-to-root mobile transcription factor HY5 coordinates plant carbon and nitrogen acquisition. Xiangbin Chen, Qinfang Yao, Xiuhua Gao, Caifu Jiang, Nicholas P. Harberd and Xiangdong Fu (2016). Current Biology 26, (in press) http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2015.12.066 Belfield, E.J, Brown, C, Gan, X, Jiang, C, Baban, D, Mithani, A, Mott, R, Ragoussis, J, Harberd, N.P. (2014) Microarray-based optimization to detect genomic deletion mutations Genomics Data. 2: pp 53-54. doi:10.1016/j.gdata.2014.04.005. Belfield, E.J, Brown, C, Gan, X, Jiang, C, Baban, D, Mithani, A, Mott, R, Ragoussis, J, Harberd, N.P. (2014) Microarray-based ultra-high resolution discovery of genomic deletion mutations BMC Genomics. 15 (1):. doi:10.1186/1471-2164-15-224.