Understanding the Biochemical Continuity of the ER and Chloroplast

叶绿体是植物细胞的绿色细胞器，是细胞的代谢工厂。叶绿体将光转化为化学能，然后被细胞用来合成地球上生命赖以生存的数十万种化合物。像任何工厂一样，叶绿体不是孤立运作的，而是与其他细胞器合作合成大多数植物化合物。协同合成最常见的是非极性(脂溶)化合物，如植物油、色素和挥发性风味化合物，但非极性生物合成中间体如何在植物细胞器之间移动仍不清楚。该项目建立在发现这种化合物在细胞器之间移动的新机制的基础上；为了扩展工厂的类比，我们发现，与长期以来假设的那样，叶绿体和其他细胞器不是使用手推车在细胞器之间运输中间体，而是建立一个共享壁(膜)，从而创建一个公共的非极性中间体池，供任何一个细胞器中的酶访问。研究人员将采用生化、遗传和分子方法来测试在这个界面上可以接触到的化合物的范围，并确定其限度和工作原理。由此产生的数据将在植物代谢工程中产生广泛的影响和影响，以生产用于食品、饲料、燃料和工业应用的非极性代谢物。对本科生的培训，特别是对家庭中第一个上大学的学生的培训，将是这项研究不可或缺的组成部分。这些研究的数据将通过同行评审的手稿或通过研讨会或讲座以及在会议上的海报展示向公众分发。一旦发表，所有转基因或突变株系、构建物和其他分子工具将要么捐赠给拟南芥库存中心，要么根据标准研究实践，应要求提供给感兴趣的各方。

Chloroplasts are green organelles of plant cells and are the metabolic factories of the cell. Chloroplasts convert light into chemical energy, which is then used by the cell to synthesize hundreds of thousands of compounds upon which life on the planet depends. Like any factory, chloroplasts do not operate in isolation but rather collaborate with other organelles to synthesize most plant compounds. Collaborative synthesis is most common for non-polar (fat-soluble) compounds such as plant oils, pigments and volatile flavor compounds, but how non-polar biosynthetic intermediates move between plant organelles has remained unknown. The project builds on the discovery of a novel mechanism for this movement of compounds between organelles; to extend the factory analogy, we have found that rather than using carts to transport intermediates between organelles, as has long been assumed, the chloroplast and other organelles build a shared wall (membrane) which creates a common pool of non-polar intermediates to be accessed by enzymes in either organelle. The investigators will take biochemical, genetic and molecular approaches to test the range of compounds accessible at this interface and define its limits and operating principles. The resulting data will have broad implications and impacts in the engineering of plant metabolism to produce non-polar metabolites for food, feed, fuel and industrial applications. Training of undergraduates, especially for student's who are the first to attend college in their family, will be an integral component of the research. Data from these studies will be distributed to the public through peer-reviewed manuscripts or through seminars or talks and poster presentations at meetings. Once published, all transgenic or mutant lines, constructs, and other molecular tools will be either donated to the Arabidopsis stock center or will be provided upon request to interested parties in keeping with standard research practices.