Welcome to the homepage for Bio398A: Topics in Plant Biology!

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William Terzaghi

Professor of Biology

• Office: SLC 363
• Office Hours: MWF 12-1, TR 1-2 in SLC363 or by appointment
• Telephone number: (570) 408-4762
• email: terzaghi@wilkes.ed

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1. Plant biofuel related
   • Novel biofuels
     • Lipid-producing sugar cane http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/bbb.1640/pdf
   • Novel ways to enhance biofuel production
     • Transcription factor that lets algae overproduce lipids w/o N-starvation http://phys.org/news/2016-03-scientists-key-algae-biofuel.html#jCp
     • Altering ACP to make shorter fatty acids http://biotechnologyforbiofuels.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13068-016-0430-4
   • Novel plants
     • Very high productivity by a C3 grass http://www.nature.com/articles/srep20694?trendmd-shared=0
   • Biophotovoltaics http://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlehtml/2015/ee/c4ee03875d
2. Photosynthesis related
   • Enhancing light harvesting
   • Enhancing carbon capture
     • Carboxysomes in higher plants
     • Carbonic anhydrase
     • C4 rice
     • Transferring photosynthesis to new organisms http://biofuels-news.com/display_news/10098/newly_discovered_bacteria_may_enable_photosynthetic_biofuel_production/
3. Plant biotechnology related
   • Plantibodies (Michael)
   • Plant virus used for cancer immunotherapy http://www.genengnews.com/gen-news-highlights/plant-virus-used-as-cancer-immunotherapy-agent/81252142/#.VnrS4JuED1o.gmail
   • Other useful products made in plants
     • Tobacco-based vaccines (Austin) http://www.pharmpro.com/news/2016/03/new-tobacco-based-vaccines-alternative-egg-based-influenza-vaccine#.VuNjfP1FqJM.gmail
   • Bioremediation
     • Heavy metals
     • Pesticides
     • ???
4. Agriculture related
   • Crop improvement by GMO or “wide-breeding”(molecular breeding)
   • Marker-assisted breeding https://passel.unl.edu/pages/informationmodule.php?idinformationmodule=1087488148
   • Identifying “crowding-tolerance genes” in corn http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0147418
   • Vitamins
     • Golden rice for vitamin A http://science.sciencemag.org/content/287/5451/303.long
   • Essential amino acids (Shyanne)
   • Iron
     • GE rice with high iron and zinc http://ricetoday.irri.org/genetically-engineered-rice-with-high-levels-of-iron-and-zinc-is-developed/
   • Other nutrients
     • Purple limes making anthocyanins http://journal.ashspublications.org/content/141/1/54.abstract
     • Increasing triacylglycerol content of potatoes http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/pbi.12550/full
     • Reducing fertilizer needs
     • Selecting for water-use efficiency
     • Selecting for efficiency of other nutrients
     • Moving N-fixation to other species
     • Improving mycorrhizae
     • GMO for weed and pest control
       • Round-up resistance (Jordan)
       • BT toxin
       • Bt eggplant http://www.isaaa.org/resources/publications/pocketk/48/default.asp
       • Treating viruses, viroids, etc by GMO
       • Resistances to other pests (nematodes??) (Somiah) http://www.nature.com/articles/srep08127
       • Resistances to other pathogens
       • Resistances to other herbicides
       • GMO for shortening the juvenile phase in citrus plants http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/pbi.12555/full

Spend ~ 5’- 10’ setting the stage:

• what is the general question?
• Why is it important?
• What was previously known?
• What were the outstanding questions?

Then state the specific question addressed in your paper

Next explain how they studied it

• General overview of techniques first
• then specifics
• What were they trying to do?
• how did they do it?

Then describe their results

• General overview first
• Then specific experiments
  • Specific purpose of each experiment
  • How they tested it
  • Data they collected
  • Controls!!
  • How they analyzed it

Conclusions they drew

Your interpretation

• Do you agree?
• How could they improve

Bioinformatics resources

• http://www.genome.jp/kegg/
  • http://www.genome.jp/kegg/pathway.html
• http://www.gramene.org/
  • http://www.gramene.org/pathways
• http://genome.microbedb.jp/cyanobase/SYNPCC7942
• http://www-cyanosite.bio.purdue.edu/
• https://sites.google.com/a/umich.edu/the-marsh-lab/aldehyde-decarbonylase

1. Jan 18
2. Jan 20
3. Jan 22
4. Jan 25
5. Jan 27
6. Jan 29
7. Feb 1
8. Feb 3
9. Feb 8
10. Feb 10
11. Feb 12
12. Feb 15
13. Feb 17
14. Feb 19
15. Teresa's lecture
16. Feb 22
17. Feb 24
18. Feb 26
19. Feb 29
20. Mar 4
21. Mar 14
22. Mar 16
23. Mar 18
24. Mar 21
25. Mar 30
26. April 1
27. April 4
28. April 6
29. April 8

1. Lab 1 Instructions
2. Lab 2 Instructions
3. Lab 3 Instructions

1. Lab 1 Data Sheet
2. Lab 3 Data Sheet

• Arabidopsis thaliana database
• MPSS
• Gramene
• SIGnAL
• iPLANT

Plant Stress links

• Plant Stress.com
• Recognizing plant stress
• LSU plant stress lab

Organizations

Collections of Biology links

Will Terzaghi's home page

running club

Wilkes Home Page