Molecular characterization and functional analysis of ethylene receptors in plants

乙烯是一种植物激素，几乎每个人都在自己的厨房里试验过。将成熟的香蕉和其他未成熟的水果放在纸袋中会加快成熟过程，因为从成熟的水果中释放的气态激素乙烯可以与未成熟水果中的特定受体相互作用。在这个研究项目中，我们试图了解在植物中感受到乙烯后会发生什么，以及这种激素信号是如何被转导和转化为植物生理变化的。除了果实成熟，乙烯还负责触发许多其他植物过程，如种子萌发、开花时间，以及对环境胁迫或病原体攻击的反应。我们将研究其中的几个过程，并研究乙烯在每种情况下的作用。大部分研究将在模式植物拟南芥中进行，但我们也将应用我们的知识来理解两种重要植物--马铃薯和杨树--的乙烯功能。最终，这项研究将使人们更好地了解这种激素在植物发育过程中的作用，并确定这种激素在未来改良农业和林业作物方面的潜在用途。

Ethylene is a plant hormone that virtually everyone has experimented with in their own kitchen. Putting a ripe banana in a paper bag with other non-ripe fruit will speed up the ripening process, because the gaseous hormone ethylene released from the ripe fruit can interact with specific receptors in the unripe fruit. In this research program, we are trying to understand what happens after ethylene is sensed in the plant, and how that hormone signal is transduced and converted to a change in the physiology of the plant. Besides fruit ripening, ethylene is responsible for triggering many other plant processes such as seed germination, flowering time, and responses to environmental stresses or pathogen attack. We will study several of these processes and investigate how ethylene acts in each case. Most of this research will be carried out in a model plant Arabidopsis, but we will also apply our knowledge to the understanding of ethylene fucntion in two important plants, potato and poplar. Ultimately this research will lead to a better understanding of the role of this hormone during plant development and identify potential uses of this hormone to improve agricultural and forest crops in the future.