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Signaling networks in plant responses to nutrient limitation

The main goal of our research is to understand how primary nitrogen and sulphur metabolism is regulated and coordinated and how they modulate plant growth and development. We are especially interested in the way other adverse environmental conditions like extreme temperatures and drought modulate nutrient status and nutrient stress responses

Grupo de investigación dependiente del

Departamento de Biotecnología

In nature, plants usually grow in soil that contains very low amounts of macronutrients like Nitrogen and Sulphur or might suffer from an unbalanced proportion of both macronutrients. To adapt and grow in nutrient-deprived environments, plants have developed sophisticated strategies and molecular mechanisms to cope with different nutrient limitations. In fact, when plants have to deal with limitations of a specific nutrient, the metabolism of other nutrients will be adjusted to maintain proper growth and development in a specific environment.

Besides, different studies suggested that the balance between nitrogen (N), sulphur (S) and carbon (C) rather than one single metabolite, affects global gene expression. In addition, cellular C and N/S metabolism is closely coordinated for C-N-S-containing metabolite synthesis at the biochemical level and also for long-distance sensing and signalling of the C/N and S balance. Multiomic analysis suggested that both N and S starvation and N or S-resupply after starvation affect many genes/metabolites involved in C or N-S metabolism. Despite all genome-wide analyses, the mechanisms underlying the crosstalk among C, N and S metabolic pathways is unclear, as is the crosstalk of C, N and S with other nutrient metabolic pathways and only a few regulators have been identified

Investigation

Our lab has 3 main objectives of research:

1-System analyses of Plant Nitrogen & Sulphur metabolism.

Our research interests can be divided into 2 interconnected aims:

We are looking for regulatory components involved in nitrate and sulphate signalling pathways. Especially we are interested in the ones that would help us to understand local and systemic responses to S/N nutritional status.
We try to understand the molecular events that connect nutrient stress signalling and hormone signalling to responses to other environmental stress conditions like drought or extreme temperatures, which often limit nutrient uptake and assimilation.

2-Environmental genomics and computational modelling the Interaction of plants and root associated bacteria enhancing plant mineral nutrition.

We are studying the nutritional responses of plant species living in extreme environments which includes the ones growing in nutrient poor-soils or hyper-arid, arid and semi-arid regions like the Atacama Desert in Chile. The main goal is to identify specific adaptations, new strategies, biochemical pathways and genes that allow plants to live in such extreme conditions. In collaboration with Drs Mauricio Gonzalez, Rodrigo Gutierrez and Mark Wilkinson, we are analysing the structure and dynamics of the plant-associated soil microbiome as it responds to natural and applied perturbations.

3-Improve nutrient use efficiency in crops.

Up to now, most crop varieties have been selected and domesticated under non-limiting Nutrient conditions. To reduce the excessive input of fertilizers without affecting plant growth and productivity it is crucial to improve both Nutrient uptake and assimilation of plants under low or moderate Nutrient supply. Actually, our objective is to obtain new crops with enhanced Nutrient use efficiency (NUE). We are using different genetic approaches based on utilizing existing natural variation for NUE traits in a crop model like tomato and wheat. In addition, we are designing different molecular strategies for transferring the identified nutritional-related regulatory modules in different crops such as cereals or solanaceae species.

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