| Affiliations: |
This work will be conducted in the Laboratory of Dr. Daniel Ebbole in the Department of Plant Pathology and Microbiology
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| Project Leader: | Nick Farmer nfarmer@tamu.edu Plant Pathology and Microbiology |
| Faculty Mentor: | Dr. Dan Ebbole, Ph.D. |
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Meeting Times:
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TBD |
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Team Size:
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3 (Team Full) |
| Open Spots: | 0 |
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Special Opportunities:
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BESC students can satisfy BESC 484 credit requirements with this semester-long project. Students from any major may wish to receive credit for a research course (BESC491, GENE491, etc.). Students hoping to fulfill requirements for research credits should contact their departmental adviser to seek approval for research course credit. The data gathered by participating students will contribute to research intended to be published in scientific journals
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Team Needs:
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Motivated students with interests in Genetics, Biochemistry, Biology, Plant Pathology, Microbiology, and Molecular Genetics should apply. Team members will be expected maintain good attendance at scheduled laboratory sessions, detailed lab notes, and to submit a final report on their research and findings for the semester. Interested students should submit their class schedule for the semester as well as a list of relevant coursework completed. |
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Description:
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Rice and wheat provide about 40 % of the calories in the human diet worldwide. Rice blast is recognized as the greatest disease threat to rice production. A new disease caused by this fungus has recently become a threat to global wheat production. This research addresses the question of how we can feed a global population of close to 10 billion people without destroying our planet. This will be accomplished by understanding the ways in which the fungus manipulates plant susceptibility to the disease. Fungi secrete proteins into the cells of their plant host and these proteins then interact with plant proteins to modulate their functions. Not surprisingly, some of these plant proteins are components of plant defense pathways. Our lab is identifying the rice proteins that interact with proteins from the fungus. Over the course of the semester, the team of undergraduate students will gain experience in general laboratory practices, and techniques in fungal and bacterial microbiology and molecular biology. Specific techniques include transformation of DNA into bacteria and yeast cells, using yeast two-hybrid technology to identify candidate protein-protein interactions, amplifying DNA with PCR to identify cloned genes, and isolation of DNA for DNA sequencing to identify the rice genes. In future work, the rice genes you identify, may be used to produce modified versions of the protein that are immune to the pathogen protein. |