Molecular Genetics of Silica Biology in Plants

All plants obtain silicon during normal growth, and accumulate it to different levels depending on species and environment. Si has been shown to have benefits for crop productivity and pathogen defence, and the importance of Si varies between species, with some crops such as rice being highly dependent on this element for normal growth and productivity, and others having little dependence. As well as having agricultural importance, Si can be a confounding factor in a number of industrial applications of plant biomass. For example, cereal straw Si content can render it unsuitable for combustion and co-firing for power generation, and also impairs the production of full value during biorefining. Despite the impacts of Si in agriculture and bioenergy and biorefining, knowledge of Si biology in plants and the regulation of Si accumulation is not well understood. We have been studying Si accumulation in the model grass Brachypodium distachyon and identified a number of mutants with altered acquisition. This project will involve identifying the underlying gene mutations responsible for altered Si and studying the mutant plants to understand the biology of Si in these plants.