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

职业：木质部综合功能：储存、运输和生物力学分析

• 批准号: 0845125
• 负责人: Robert Brandon Pratt
• 金额: $ 78.23万
• 依托单位: California State University-Bakersfield
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-02-01 至 2015-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0845125&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: CAREER; Integrated; xylem; function; analysis

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.

木材，或木质部，是一种全球重要的商品，几千年来一直是人类建筑材料、住所和燃料的重要来源。在植物中，木材构成了水运输组织，这对于在整个植物体内运输水和化学物质以保持健康的功能至关重要。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、生态系统如何运作以及植物如何进化也很重要。木材除了运输水分外，还具有支撑植物体结构、储存水分和养分等重要功能。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可能在另一种功能上很差，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。储存是木材的一项重要功能，但对木材储存如何与木材的输水和机械支撑功能相结合还缺乏研究。拟议的研究将研究木质部的功能权衡，重点是加利福尼亚生物多样性地中海型气候区域植物的储存与运输和生物力学特性如何相互作用。为了更广泛地理解这一主题，采样物种将包括具有常绿和落叶叶习性的木本植物，以及火灾后发芽或不发芽的植物。分析将包括茎和根。该项目将在贝克斯菲尔德加州州立大学少数民族服务机构的本科生和硕士生以及博士后学者的教学中提供帮助。正在进行的研究将在校园环境研究区进行展示，这将提高教育影响，该研究区每年接待约6000名游客，从小学生到老年人。此外，还将为高中/社区大学的学生和教师开设一个暑期项目，开展与木材功能相关的植物研究。