Cold Acclimation in Arabidopsis thaliana

极端的环境条件，如低温和高温、干旱和高盐度，严重限制了植物的地理分布，并在很大程度上造成了潜在作物产量和实际作物产量之间的差距。然而，许多植物已经进化出机制，使它们能够适应并在不同程度上生存下来，即不同形式的环境“压力”。首席研究员的长期研究兴趣是在分子和细胞水平上了解植物在寒冷和冰冻温度下生存的适应性反应。他最近证实，与许多其他植物一样，拟南芥在非冰冻温度较低的情况下会变得更耐寒，基因表达的变化会发生在这个寒冷的驯化过程中。他现在的目标是确定冷调节(“COR”)基因的功能。他的具体目标包括：COR基因的分离和测序；确定COR多肽是否具有低温保护作用；构建和分析拟南芥COR突变体；确定COR基因产物的细胞和亚细胞位置；以及确定拟南芥COR基因在植物中是否高度保守。至少，这些研究应该为了解低温下植物发生的分子和生理变化提供更多的洞察力。它们还具有产生基因的潜力，这些基因可以用来提高重要农艺植物的耐寒性和耐冻性。

Extremes in environmental conditions such as low and high temperature, drought, and high salinity, severely limit the geographical distribution of plants and account in large part for the shortfalls between potential and actual crop yields. Many plants, however, have evolved mechanisms that enable them to acclimate to and survive to varying degrees, different forms of environmental "stress." The long term research interest of the Principal Investigator is to understand at a molecular and cellular level the adaptive responses that plants make to survive cold and freezing temperatures. He has recently established that Arabidopsis, like many other plants, becomes more frost tolerant when exposed to low nonfreezing temperatures and that changes in gene expression occur during this cold acclimation process. His goal now is to determine the functions of the cold-regulated ("cor") genes. His specific aims include: the isolation and sequencing of cor genes; determining whether COR polypeptides have cryoprotective effects; the construction and analysis of Adrabidopsis cor mutants; determining the cellular and subcellular location of the COR gene products; and determining whether Arabidopsis cor genes are highly conserved among plants. At a minimum, these studies should provide additional insight into the molecular and physiological changes that occur in plants at low temperature. They also have the potential of yielding genes that could be used to improve the cold and freezing tolerance of agronomically important plants.