NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology FY 2020: Untangling the Environmental and Genetic Drivers of Phenological Timing in Red Oak (Quercus rubra) to Improve Predictions

2020 财年 NSF 生物学博士后奖学金：解开红橡树 (Quercus rubra) 物候时间的环境和遗传驱动因素，以改进预测

• 批准号: 2010781
• 负责人: Meghan Blumstein
• 金额: $ 21.6万
• 依托单位: Blumstein, Meghan
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Fellowship Award
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-09-01 至 2023-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2010781&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: NSF; Postdoctoral; Fellowship; Biology; FY

This action funds an NSF National Plant Genome Initiative Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2020. The fellowship supports a research and training plan in a host laboratory for the Fellow who also presents a plan to broaden participation in biology. The title of the research and training plan for this fellowship to Meghan Blumstein is "Untangling the Environmental and Genetic Drivers of Phenological Timing in Red Oak (Quercus rubra) to Improve Climate Predictions". The host institutions for the fellowship are the Center for Functional Ecology and Evolution (Montpellier, FR) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the sponsoring scientists are Drs. David Des Marais and Isabelle Chuine. Forests absorb a large proportion of carbon emissions each year via photosynthesis, making them a key player in mitigating global change. Thus, knowing when trees start and end photosynthesis each year is essential to predicting future warming. Extensive research has shown that the timing of leaf-out in trees is governed by both genetics and environment. However, no study to date has combined our understanding of these two drivers and their interaction into one framework. This study will address this need by elucidating how environment and genetics interact to alter leaf-out timing in the North American species red oak (Quercus rubra). Broader impacts include broadening participation of students from underrepresented groups and the generation of new genomic and phenotypic resources that will improve the ability to predict leaf-out timing and provide guidance for setting up assisted migration conservation programs aimed to speed the movement of locally adapted individuals northward in pace with environmental change. Training objectives for the Fellow include genomics, gene expression profiling, ecophysiology, and process-based modeling. This project will leverage a wide-spread system of phenological cameras (phenocams) in a novel way to quantify the genetic and environmental drivers of leaf-out variation in red oak and integrate this into a process-based model. Specific objectives include: 1) genetically sequencing red oak individuals growing in phenocam "viewsheds". These sequences will be used to derive population structure and develop a set of candidate loci associated with phenological timing; 2) experimentally manipulating twigs collected after budset from a subset of individuals to parse out the environmental versus genetic drivers of variation; 3) collecting gene expression data via transcriptomics to further refine candidate loci; and, 4) modifying existing process-based model structures to test hypotheses regarding how the inclusion of population structure, genetic variation, and local adaptation can improve model performance and alter our predictions. This project will provide a broad array of mentoring and research training for graduate and undergraduate students via summer and term-time programs aimed at increasing diversity in STEM fields. In addition, the Fellow will participate in public outreach via the U.S. and French National Phenological Networks' citizen science programs, civic engagement via the MIT Policy Lab, and mentoring All genomic data will be made publicly available on the Hardwood Genomics Project open-source database (https://www.hardwoodgenomics.org/).Keywords: Rules of Life, predictive modeling, genomics, genotype x environment interactions (GxE), image acquisition using phenological cameras, red oak (Quercus rubra)This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

该行动资助了2020财年NSF国家植物基因组计划生物学博士后研究奖学金。该研究金支持研究员在东道实验室的研究和培训计划，研究员还提出了扩大生物学参与的计划。Meghan Blumstein的研究和培训计划的标题是“解开红橡树（Quercus rubra）物候定时的环境和遗传驱动因素，以改善气候预测”。该奖学金的主办机构是功能生态学和进化中心（蒙彼利埃，法国）和马萨诸塞州理工学院（麻省理工学院），赞助科学家是大卫德马雷博士和伊莎贝尔Chuine。森林每年通过光合作用吸收很大一部分碳排放，使其成为减缓全球变化的关键角色。因此，了解树木每年何时开始和结束光合作用对于预测未来变暖至关重要。广泛的研究表明，树木长叶的时间是由遗传和环境共同决定的。然而，迄今为止还没有研究将我们对这两个驱动因素及其相互作用的理解结合到一个框架中。本研究将解决这一需要，阐明环境和遗传相互作用，以改变叶子的时间在北美红橡树（栎红）。更广泛的影响包括扩大学生的参与，从代表性不足的群体和新的基因组和表型资源的产生，这将提高预测叶出时间的能力，并为建立协助移民保护计划提供指导，旨在加快当地适应个人的运动北与环境变化的步伐。研究员的培训目标包括基因组学，基因表达谱，生态生理学和基于过程的建模。 该项目将以一种新的方式利用广泛分布的物候相机系统（phenocams）来量化红橡木中叶子变化的遗传和环境驱动因素，并将其整合到基于过程的模型中。具体目标包括：1）对生长在phenocam“视域”中的红橡树个体进行基因测序。这些序列将用于推导种群结构并开发一组与物候时间相关的候选基因座; 2）实验性地操纵从一个子集的个体中在出芽后收集的枝条，以解析出变异的环境与遗传驱动因素; 3）通过转录组学收集基因表达数据，以进一步细化候选基因座;以及，4）修改现有的基于过程的模型结构，以测试关于包括种群结构、遗传变异和局部适应如何能够改善模型性能并改变我们的预测的假设。该项目将通过暑期和学期计划为研究生和本科生提供广泛的指导和研究培训，旨在增加STEM领域的多样性。此外，该研究员将通过美国和法国国家物候网络的公民科学计划参与公共宣传，通过麻省理工学院政策实验室参与公民参与，并指导所有基因组数据将在硬木基因组学项目开源数据库上公开（https：//www.hardwoodgenomics.org/）.关键词：生命规则，预测建模，基因组学，基因型x环境相互作用（GxE），使用物候相机的图像采集，红橡树（Quercus rubra）该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

项目成果

Global variation in nonstructural carbohydrate stores in response to climate

• DOI: 10.1111/gcb.16573
• 发表时间: 2022-12
• 期刊: Global Change Biology
• 影响因子: 11.6
• 作者: M. Blumstein;Jessica T. Gersony;J. Martínez‐Vilalta;A. Sala

Interannual dynamics of stemwood nonstructural carbohydrates in temperate forest trees surrounding drought

• DOI: 10.1007/s11676-022-01566-2
• 发表时间: 2022-11-16
• 期刊: JOURNAL OF FORESTRY RESEARCH
• 影响因子: 3
• 作者: Blumstein, Meghan J.;Furze, Morgan E.
• 通讯作者: Furze, Morgan E.