How do cells communicate when it’s hot? (FAULKNER_J26DTP)

Plant cells are connected to their neighbours via ‘tubes’ called plasmodesmata, creating an interconnected cytoplasm that joins cells within and between tissues and organs. Many molecules use plasmodesmata to move freely between cells and it is critical for a plant to tightly control how open its plasmodesmata are to enable control over how far molecular information and resources can travel through tissues. Indeed, this control is important to how a plant responds to many different environmental and developmental changes, including immune responses when it is being invaded by a pathogen.

We, and others, have identified many components of the mechanisms by which plasmodesmata open and close when a cell perceives a stress. We know very well that when a cell is under stress that it isolates itself from its neighbours. However, we don’t know how changes in temperature affect this response, or how this affects the overall response a plant has to a pathogen infection. This is a significant gap in our knowledge in the face of increaseing global temperatures.

This project will profile how plasmodesmal responses change across a temperature gradient, and thus explore the relationship between plasmodesmal function, temperature and the success of immune responses. The student will take advantage of the extensive tools and resources available in the Faulkner lab to investigate plasmodesmal function and immune responses, and use these to generate new information and hypotheses to be tested. The project will use molecular biology, genetic and quantitative imaging approaches to gain determine how cell-to-cell connectivity via plasmodesmata underpins immune success in different environments.