International Research Fellowship Program: Evolution of Nickel Hyper-accumulation in the Plant genus Stackhousia

[09:65674]国际研究奖学金计划使美国科学家和工程师能够到国外进行9至24个月的研究。该计划的奖励为联合研究提供了机会，并利用独特或互补的设施、专业知识和国外的实验条件。该奖项将支持Dylan Burge博士与澳大利亚悉尼大学的Balwant Singh博士、悉尼皇家植物园的Maurizio Rossetto博士、南澳大利亚州植物标本馆的Bill Barker博士以及美国印第安纳大学的Loren Rieseberg博士进行为期24个月的研究。从生命本身的起源开始，进化就以适应极端环境为特征。为了了解生物多样性和预测生物对全球环境中可预测的扰动（如全球变暖）的反应，研究极端适应是很重要的。超过320种开花植物在其组织中积累的镍元素含量超过0.1%，这对大多数生物都是有毒的。这种现象被称为镍超积累，代表了对富含镍的土壤的独特适应。镍的超富集被认为是在几个植物谱系中独立进化的。最近的研究主要集中在镍超积累的生态学、遗传学和生理学上，部分原因是这些植物可能用于镍污染土壤的解毒。尽管人们对此非常感兴趣，但对特定植物群中镍超积累的进化知之甚少，这阻碍了对这种有趣而极端的植物适应性进化的研究。该项目将结合土壤科学、生态学、群体遗传学和基因组学的方法，以协同的方式设计阐明镍超积累是如何在澳大利亚植物属Stackhousia中进化的。研究还将使Stackhousia成为镍超富集演化和成因研究的一个模式系统。此外，这里开发的方法将适用于其他含有Ni超积累物种的植物群，从而更深入地了解这一有趣特性的进化，这一特性似乎在开花植物的多样化过程中至少独立发展了15次。

0965674BurgeThe International Research Fellowship Program enables U.S. scientists and engineers to conduct nine to twenty-four months of research abroad. The program's awards provide opportunities for joint research, and the use of unique or complementary facilities, expertise and experimental conditions abroad.This award will support a twenty-four-month research fellowship by Dr. Dylan Burge to work with Dr. Balwant Singh at the University of Sydney in Australia, with Dr. Maurizio Rossetto at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Sydney, with Dr. Bill Barker at the State Herbarium of South Australia and with Dr. Loren Rieseberg at Indiana University in the US.Beginning with the origin of life itself, evolution has been characterized by adaptation to extreme environments. To gain understanding of organismal diversity and anticipate the response of living things to predicted perturbations in the global environment such as global warming, it is important to study extremes of adaptation. More than 320 species of flowering plants accumulate the element nickel in their tissues to levels exceeding 0.1%, concentrations that would be toxic to most organisms. This phenomenon, known as nickel hyper-accumulation, represents a unique adaptation to soils that are rich in nickel. Nickel hyper-accumulation is thought to have evolved independently in several plant lineages. Recent research has focused on ecology, genetics, and physiology of nickel hyper-accumulation, work that is motivated in part by the potential use of these plants for detoxification of nickel contaminated soils. In spite of this great interest, little is known about evolution of nickel hyper-accumulation in specific plant groups, hindering research on the evolution of this intriguing and extreme plant adaptation. This project will combine methods from soil science, ecology, population genetics, and genomics in a synergistic approach designed to elucidate how nickel hyper-accumulation has evolved in the Australian plant genus Stackhousia. The research will also develop Stackhousia as a model system for research on the evolution and genetics of Ni hyper-accumulation. Furthermore, the approach developed here will be applicable to other plant groups containing Ni hyper-accumulating species, leading to greater insight into the evolution of this intriguing trait, which appears to have developed independently at least 15 times during the diversification of flowering plants.