Evolution, development, and mechanisms of floral organ photosynthesis.

粮食安全和气候变化是现代社会面临的两大挑战。提高作物生产力是为不断增长的人口提供足够的食物所必需的，但这不应以增加碳排放为代价。需要新的植物变种，可以使用更少的土地，捕获更多的碳，并产生更高的产量。地球仪的许多研究小组正在努力改善光合作用，以应对这些挑战，包括修改酶和改变叶片的解剖结构，以捕获更多的碳。然而，相对较少的小组专注于改善发生在叶外，茎，花和果实中的光合作用。许多物种严重依赖非叶光合作用，然而，这个过程中有许多方面我们不了解。这个项目旨在了解更多关于非叶光合作用：大自然如何利用它来改善植物健康？它是如何在基因水平上编程的？我们如何利用它来造福自然和社会？我们将把我们的努力首先集中在芥菜植物家族，因为它们包含“模式”植物以及重要的作物，如油菜。模式植物是被充分表征的植物（例如，具有测序的基因组），并且我们可以容易地修改其基因组。这一点很重要，因为要了解非叶光合作用等复杂过程的功能，需要有易于处理的系统来测试特定的假设。这种方法的力量最近已经在油菜中开发出具有抗碎果实的植物，从而显着减少收获损失。这些植物是通过直接使用从模型植物获得的知识生成的。在这里，我们将采用类似的策略。首先，我们将在遗传和生理水平上发展我们对非叶光合作用的理解。接下来，我们将利用这些知识来提出关于如何修改非叶光合作用以改善农业重要性状的具体假设。我们将在模型植物和作物植物中验证这些假设，并逐步开发改良品种。虽然我们最初将调查芥菜科的物种，但这项工作也将与其他植物科的物种有关，包括小麦，大麦和番茄，其花和果实也进行光合作用。因此，该项目标志着一个长期目标的开始，即了解非叶光合作用的演变，并制定策略来修改重要作物的光合作用。

Food security and climate change are two of the most important challenges facing modern society. Increased crop productivity is required to provide enough food for an ever-growing population, however, this should not come at a cost of increased carbon emissions. Novel plants variants that can use less land, capture more carbon, and produce higher yields are needed.Many research groups around the globe are working on improving photosynthesis to meet these challenges, which includes modifying enzymes and changing the anatomy of the leaf to capture more carbon. However, relatively few groups have focused on improving photosynthesis that occurs outside of the leaf, in stems, flowers and fruits. Many species heavily rely on non-leaf photosynthesis, however, there are many aspects of this process that we do not understand.This project aims to understand more about non-leaf photosynthesis: How has nature used it to improve plant health? How is it programmed on a genetic level? How can we manipulate it to benefit nature and society? We will focus our efforts initially on the mustard plant family because they contain 'model' plants as well as important crops, such as oilseed rape. Model plants are plants that are well-characterized (e.g. have a sequenced genome) and whose genome we can modify with ease. This is important because understanding how a complex process such as non-leaf photosynthesis functions requires the availability of tractable systems to test specific hypotheses. This power of this approach has been demonstrated recently with the development of plants with shatter-resistant fruits in oilseed rape, which reduces harvesting losses significantly. These plants were generated by directly using knowledge acquired from model plants. Here, we will employ a similar strategy. First, we will develop our understanding of non-leaf photosynthesis on genetic and physiological levels. Next, we will use this knowledge to make specific hypotheses on how to modify non-leaf photosynthesis to improve agriculturally important traits. We will test these hypotheses in both model and crop plants and develop improved varieties in a step-wise manner.Although we will initially investigate species in the mustard plant family, this work will also be relevant to species in other plant families including wheat, barley, and tomato, whose flowers and fruits also perform photosynthesis. Therefore, this project marks the beginning of a long-term goal to understand the evolution of non-leaf photosynthesis and to develop strategies to modify it in important crop plants.