Prof M Knight
No more applications being accepted
Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)
About the Project
In order to survive, plants and crops have to respond rapidly, and appropriately, to the multitude of different environmental stimuli they face. Key to this is the ability to discriminate between different stimuli e.g. pathogen attack versus drought stress. An increase in cellular calcium concentration (known as calcium signalling) acts as a trigger in plant cells to activate the appropriate response: expressing the correct proteins to defend against a specific stress. Different stimuli provoke calcium increases with different and unique properties, known as “calcium signatures” which encode the appropriate response. In nature, the appropriate response to a given stress needs to be different at different times of day to maximise fitness of the plant/crop. The Knight lab has most recently found that for pathogen stress the specific nature of pathogen-mediated calcium signature depends on the subjective
time-of-day i.e. the calcium signatures, and subsequent pathogen-induced gene expression and tolerance, are modified by the circadian clock.
This exciting finding leads to some fundamental questions that will be addressed in this PhD project:
(1) How are calcium signatures controlled by the circadian clock?
(2) Which downstream calcium decoding proteins are involved in decoding these novel calcium signatures?
(3) Which transcription factors are involved in recognising these novel calcium signatures?
(4) What is the mechanism by which these novel calcium signatures are converted into the appropriate response?
This multidisciplinary project will include a broad range of techniques encompassing calcium imaging, gene expression analysis, pathogen assays, protein kinases assays, mutant analysis, mathematical modelling and network analysis.
For further information see the website: https://www.dur.ac.uk/biosciences/
To apply
Please complete the online application form and attach a full CV and covering letter. Informal enquiries may be made to [Email Address Removed]
Funding Notes
This is a 4 year BBSRC studentship under the Newcastle-Liverpool-Durham DTP. The successful applicant will receive research costs, tuition fees and stipend (£14,777 for 2018-19). The PhD will start in October 2019. Applicants should have, or be expecting to receive, a 2.1 Hons degree (or equivalent) in a relevant subject. EU candidates must have been resident in the UK for 3 years in order to receive full support. There are 2 stages to the application process.
References
Lenzoni, G., Liu, J.L., and Knight, M.R. (2018). Predicting plant immunity gene expression by identifying the decoding mechanism of calcium signatures.
New Phytol 217, 1598-1609.
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