Teachers

How do plants adapt to their soil environments?  There are 17 essential elements for plants, including N, P, and K.  Deficiency and toxicity of minerals are one major limiting factor for plant growth.  Due to immobility, plants have developed sophisticated systems for adaptation to their changing soil environments.  We aim to understand i) how the plants sense external/internal nutrient conditions, ii) how the plants regulate the growth and metabolism in response to the nutrient conditions, and iii) how the diversity of the responses have evolved under different soil environments at molecular levels.  Through understanding of the molecular mechanisms, we also challenge to generate the plants tolerant to nutrient deficiency and toxicity for sustainable plant production.

References

• Miwa, K., Takano, J., Omori, H., Seki, M., Shinozaki, K., Fujiwara, T. (2007). “Plants tolerant of high boron levels.” Science 318, 1417.
• Miwa, K., Takano, J., Fujiwara, T. (2006). “Improvement of seed yields under boron-limiting conditions through overexpression of BOR1, a boron transporter for xylem loading, in Arabidopsis thaliana.” Plant Journal. 46, 1084-1091.