CAREER: Integrated xylem function: An analysis of storage, transport, and biomechanics

木材，或木质部，是一种全球重要的商品，几千年来对人类来说一直是重要的建筑材料、住所和燃料。在植物中，木头构成了水分运输组织，这对在植物体内运输水分和化学物质以维持健康功能至关重要。了解木材的功能不仅可以更有效地利用这一重要资源，而且对于了解植物如何适应环境、生态系统如何功能以及植物如何进化也很重要。除了运输水分外，木材还具有重要的功能，如对植物身体的结构支持以及储存水分和养分。这些功能在很大程度上是相互依赖的，因此精通一种功能的木材在另一种功能上可能必然较差，从而产生权衡。了解这些权衡、它们的结构基础和进化结果是植物生物学家的中心目标。尽管储藏是木材的一项重要功能，但关于木材储藏如何与木材的水运和机械支持功能相结合的研究还很缺乏。这项拟议的研究将研究木质部功能的权衡，重点是加州生物多样性的地中海型气候地区植物之间的储存与运输和生物力学特征是如何相互作用的。为了更广泛地理解这一主题，样本物种将包括具有常绿和落叶习性的木本植物，以及在火灾后发芽或不发芽的植物。分析将包括茎和根。这个项目将帮助本科生和硕士学生的教学，以及少数族裔服务机构加州州立大学贝克斯菲尔德的博士后学者的教学。通过在校园环境研究区展示正在进行的研究，教育影响将得到加强，该研究区每年接待约6000名参观者，从学童到老年人。还将启动一个暑期项目，供高中/社区大学的学生和教师进行与木材功能相关的植物研究。

Wood, or xylem, is a globally important commodity that has been important to humans for building material, shelter, and fuel for millennia. In plants, wood makes up the water transport tissue that is crucial for moving water and chemicals throughout the plant body to maintain healthy functioning. Understanding how wood functions not only enables more efficient use of this important resource, but it is also important to the understanding of how plants are adapted to the environment, how ecosystems function, and how plants evolve. Wood has important functions besides transport of water such as structural support of the plant body and storage of water and nutrients. These functions are largely interdependent such that wood that is proficient at one function may necessarily be poor at another function giving rise to tradeoffs. Understanding these tradeoffs, their structural basis, and evolutionary consequences is a central objective for plant biologists. Although storage is an important wood function, research is lacking on how wood storage integrates with the water transport and mechanical support functions of wood. The proposed study will examine xylem functional tradeoffs with an emphasis on how storage interacts with transport and biomechanical traits among plants in California's biodiverse Mediterranean type climate region. To get a broad understanding of this topic, sampled species will include woody plants with evergreen and deciduous leaf habits, and plants that either sprout after fires or those that do not sprout. Analyses will include both stems and roots. This project will aid in the teaching of undergraduate and Master's students, and a post-doctoral scholar at a minority serving institution, California State University, Bakersfield. The educational impact will be heightened by presentation of the ongoing research at an on campus Environmental Study Area, which hosts about 6000 visitors annually ranging from school children to seniors. A summer program will also be initiated for high school/community college students and teachers to conduct plant research related to wood function.