Plant Productivity and Sustainable Agriculture Group,University of Essex,Wivenhoe Park,Colchester, CO4 3SQUKMini-biographyPhil Mullineaux is Professor of Plant Molecular Biology in the Plant Productivity and Sustainable Agriculture Group in the Department of Biological Sciences at the University of Essex, a post he took up in June 2004. Prior to this post, he was a group leader at the John Innes Centre in the Dept. of Disease and Stress Biology. He obtained a first class honour degree and PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Wales. Over a 24 year postdoctoral research career, he has published over 100 peer-reviewed research papers most recently, on oxidative stress responses in plant-environment interactions. The long term thesis underpinning his research has been that production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) is a common component of abiotic stress responses in plants. Therefore, an understanding of ROS-directed signalling processes, will uncover genes that play an important role in governing many plant stress responses. This strategy is now bearing fruit. It is my hope that the GL-TTP will allow a research partnership to be forged which moves our studies from model to crop plant species.
Exploitation of a transcription factor that promotes increased seed yield under well-watered and water deficit situations and does not compromise resistance to pathogen infection
Phil Mullineaux
Plant Productivity and Sustainable Agriculture Group, University of Essex, Wivenhoe Park, Colchester, CO4 3SQ UK.
mullin@essex.ac.ukI am attending the GL-TTP meeting to make contacts regarding the further exploitation of work we have conducted with a transcription factor from Arabidopsis which, when over-expressed constitutively in the same species, promotes the following traits:
• A near doubling of seed yield accompanied by significant increases in seed weight under well watered conditions;
• Maintenance of this increased seed yield under moderate to severe water limiting conditions. Thus this gene promotes water productivity under a range of water availabilities;
• Dramatically increased recovery of the whole plant from severe drought stress;
• Major increase in basal resistance to infection by biotrophic pathogens
Our research over the last 3 years as led to a clear view of how these traits are being manifested in Arabidopsis and detailed description of the whole plant phenotype under non-stress and stress conditions. My communication at the meeting will briefly describe the key features of the traits at the whole plant and molecular level.
We are currently in the process of making a patent application, which will have been filed by the time of the meeting. Therefore, I shall be in a position to discuss more openly the identity of the gene encoding this trait. We have obtained BBSRC funding to transfer the trait to oil seed rape. This project is due to begin in April 2007.
My objectives for attending the GL-TTP meeting is to make contacts with legume researchers and breeders and make some provisional plans to exploit the gene in legumes, exploring further mechanistic and agronomic traits in target crop species, in collaborative projects based both in the laboratory and the field.
