Collaborative Research on Plant Stress Response Through Innovations in Phenomics and Molecular Imaging Technologies

阿肯色州和密苏里州的科学家提议建立一个跨学科的、最先进的生物成像联盟，使研究人员能够调整粮食、纤维和燃料作物，以应对气候变化和世界人口增长的挑战。 植物适应压力的能力，以及通过生物技术和育种来增强这些适应能力，是减轻农业经济所面临的越来越大的压力的一种手段。 阿肯色州科技局、阿肯色州大学费耶特维尔分校、阿肯色州大学派恩海崖分校、密苏里州大学、林肯大学和华盛顿大学圣路易斯分校的研究人员将利用分子和植物成像技术产生新的工具和发现，以减少作物因干旱、盐碱、昆虫和疾病等压力而造成的损失。 该项目将促进多样化和包容性的劳动力发展做法，同时培训学生，并通过实习和一系列联合研讨会与私营企业建立联系。 此外，该小组将通过与行业合作，为生物成像的小学和本科教育开发新的能力模型，促进科学，技术，工程和数学（STEM）教育。 该模型将通过为K-12教师传播实践教学模块来培养关键能力，并通过创建本科和研究生课程模块来实施。技术描述生物成像技术具有变革潜力，可以克服目前限制预测遗传变异表型后果的能力的表型瓶颈。 拟议中的AR和MO植物生物成像联盟将汇集多个学科（合成化学，放射化学，成像科学，植物生物学，生物工程，计算生物学和信息学），以解决气候变化增加的后果，也是生物学五大挑战领域之一，具体来说，预测生物体？的表型基于其基因型。 多学科团队将在四个实验模型上合作，以产生植物胁迫生物学的新知识，并开发植物科学界必不可少的生物成像工具。 该联盟还将创建一个种子资助计划，使整个AR和MO的植物生物学家能够应用生物成像方法来研究多种植物物种的各种胁迫反应。 植物生物学的新知识将包括更好地理解四个关键的生理过程-营养物质的运输，活性氧的积累，抗氧化剂的代谢和光合同化物的分配-是如何在应对压力的调制。 方法上的进展将包括新的协议，分子探针，数据分析算法，以及管道所需的HTP和MI植物胁迫生物学。 在这个研究基础设施改善轨道-2项目的三年期间，该计划预计将为该地区的130多名植物生物学家提供服务，同时直接培训第一批20名本科生，研究生和博士后学者。 该联盟将帮助建立AR和MO发展生物技术产业所需的关键跨学科劳动力，这是两个州计划的创新经济的主要组成部分。 最后，拟议的活动将通过为K-12学校开发新的、以证据为基础的、实践性的教学技术和科学战略，促进这两个州的科学素养。

Non-technical DescriptionScientists in Arkansas and Missouri propose to create an interdisciplinary, state-of-the-art Bioimaging Consortium that enables researchers to adapt food, fiber, and fuel crops to meet the challenges of a changing climate and a growing world population. The ability of plants to adapt to stress, and the enhancement of these adaptations via biotechnology and breeding represent a means of mitigating the increased pressure on the agricultural economy. Researchers at the Arkansas Science and Technology Authority, the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville, the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, the University of Missouri, Lincoln University, and Washington University St. Louis will use molecular and plant imaging techniques to generate new tools and discoveries to reduce crop losses to stresses such as drought, salinity, insects and diseases. The project will promote diverse and inclusive workforce development practices while training students and creating linkages with private industry through internships and a joint seminar series. In addition, the group will promote science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education by working with industry to develop a new competency model for primary and undergraduate education in bioimaging. This model will be implemented by disseminating a hands-on teaching module for K-12 teachers to develop key competencies, and by creating undergraduate and graduate course modules.Technical Description Bioimaging technologies have transformative potential to overcome the phenotyping bottleneck that currently limits the ability to predict the phenotypic consequences of genetic variation. The proposed AR and MO Plant Bioimaging Consortium will bring together multiple disciplines (synthetic chemistry, radiochemistry, imaging science, plant biology, bioengineering, computational biology and informatics) to address a consequence of increased climate variability, and also one of the Five Grand Challenge areas in biology, specifically, to predict an organism?s phenotype based on its genotype. Multi-disciplinary teams will work collaboratively on four experimental models to generate new knowledge in plant stress biology and develop bioimaging tools essential to the plant science community. The consortium will also create a seed grant program to enable plant biologists throughout AR and MO to apply bioimaging approaches to study a wide variety of stress responses in multiple plant species. New knowledge in plant biology will include a better understanding of how four key physiological processes - the transport of nutrients, accumulation of reactive oxygen species, metabolism of antioxidants, and partitioning of photoassimilates - are modulated in response to stress. Methodological advances will include new protocols, molecular probes, data analysis algorithms, and pipelines needed to apply HTP and MI to plant stress biology. During the three years of this Research Infrastructure Improvement Track-2 project, the program expects to provide services to over 130 plant biologists in the region, while directly training the first wave of twenty undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral scholars in bioimaging. The consortium will help build the critical interdisciplinary workforce that AR and MO need to develop a biotechnology industry, which is a major component of the innovation economy planned for both states. Lastly, the proposed activities would advance scientific literacy in the two states by developing new, evidence-based, hands-on teaching techniques and science strategies for K-12 schools.