Award details

13 ERA-CAPS The role of the N-end rule pathway in controlling plant response to the environment

Reference	BB/M002268/1
Principal Investigator / Supervisor	Professor Michael Holdsworth
Co-Investigators / Co-Supervisors	Professor Neil Oldham, Dr Rumiana Ray
Institution	University of Nottingham
Department	Sch of Biosciences
Funding type	Research
Value (£)	430,809
Status	Completed
Type	Research Grant
Start date	11/04/2014
End date	31/10/2017
Duration	43 months

Abstract

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Summary

Manipulation of plants to provide stability of yield under unpredictable growth conditions will be essential to respond to the effect of climate change in increasing the uncertainty of the agricultural environment. Selective and conditional removal of regulator proteins by proteolysis is emerging as a major regulatory principle in plants. The aim of the N-vironment project is to provide a complete mechanistic understanding of the role of the N-end rule pathway of targeted proteolysis in controlling plant responses to the environment. To achieve this goal consortium partners have been selected that represent internationally leading European teams with experience in the pathways multiple facets, including the biochemical basis of the pathway, hypoxia and plant development, transcriptional regulation of stress and metabolic signalling. The project will bring together six research groups with complementary expertise in fundamental molecular plant science, biochemistry and chemistry, in four institutions. The research programme of the N-vironment consortium will be achieved through six inter-related Work Packages carried out by the four consortium partners (three funded by ERA-CAPS, one associated laboratory). The objectives of these work packages are related to three fundamental questions that arose after integration of the recent discoveries by consortium members of the role of the N-end rule pathway of targeted proteolysis as a major regulator of plant development and response to the environment. Question 1: What are the protein substrates and enzymatic components of the N-end rule pathway? Question 2: How is the Nend rule pathway integrated into cellular signaling pathways? Question 3: What is the extent of the role of the N-end rule pathway in plant response to the biotic and abiotic environment? The proposed research has highly innovative measurable outcomes that address this newly discovered area of plant biology, and will uncover: New mechanisms regulating protein stability, new mechanisms of environmental stress sensing, new functions for proteins in stress sensing, the importance of the N-end rule in a key EU crop, tomato. This fast-developing area of plant molecular science is led by N-vironment members (including discovery of substrates, methods of entry into the N-end rule pathway, biochemical components of the pathway), and together with the availability of a large number of unique resources within the consortium, makes the N-vironment proposal highly novel and timely. The synergistic value of this collaborative programme will be the development and exploitation of a highly novel area of plant biology of key importance to agriculture, in which Europe has the capacity to take a world lead through ERA-CAPS funding.

Impact Summary

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Committee	Research Committee B (Plants, microbes, food & sustainability)
Research Topics	Crop Science, Plant Science
Research Priority	X – Research Priority information not available
Research Initiative	ERA-NET on Coordinating Action in Plant Sciences (ERA-CAPS) [2013-2014]
Funding Scheme	X – not Funded via a specific Funding Scheme

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