RII Track-2 FEC: Systems Genetics Studies on Rice Genomes for Analysis of Grain Yield and Quality Under Heat Stress

关于环境压力因素（如高温）如何影响谷物作物生产的基本知识和理解对全球粮食安全很重要。水稻是一种典型的谷类植物，也是世界主要的主食作物，它生长在美国南部，受到夜间气温升高的威胁，导致产量不稳定，导致粮食产量和质量下降，从而导致市场价值下降。该项目将确定能够耐受夜间高温的个别水稻品系，并将使用各种遗传和生化技术来确定这些植物耐高温能力的潜在机制。这些机制将在植物中使用基因编辑技术进行测试，以确认这些机制以及潜在的致病等位基因是植物抵抗夜间高温的原因。了解实际的机制将有助于育种者开发新的品系，从而有助于降低未来因高温导致重大作物损失的风险。该项目将由阿肯色大学费耶特维尔分校和小石城分校、路易斯安那州立大学和俄克拉荷马州立大学共同努力，将帮助发展六名早期职业研究教师的职业生涯，培养本科生和研究生以及博士后。此外，这些项目将为STEM在本科和K-12阶段建立教育资源。技术描述粳稻亚种是目前生产的大多数美国品种的基础，并已在美国育种工作中与世界各地的其他水稻一起用于选择耐高温的品种。在这个项目中，对美国生产至关重要的多种水稻品系将在田间筛选，包括不同夜间温度的环境，并在受控的温室条件下进行复制，以确定耐热基因型，其中有贡献基因和新机制，这些基因型和新机制对改善水稻和其他谷物的耐高温能力有兴趣。归因于所需表型的等位基因的遗传变化或鉴定将在多系统水平上进行表征：转录组、代谢组、蛋白质组和生理反应。来自这些分析的信息将被整合到基因调控网络中，从而提供对独立基因型中记录的植物适应环境变化的生物学理解。从群体研究中鉴定的野生型或突变型等位基因将通过转化和CRISPR/Cas9介导的等位基因工程进行验证，随后进行表型验证以鉴定与耐热性相关的等位基因，作为在品种开发中使用的概念证明。这项研究基础设施改善轨道2聚焦EPSCoR合作（RII轨道2 FEC）项目汇集了来自阿肯色大学费耶特维尔分校和小石城分校、路易斯安那州立大学和俄克拉荷马州立大学的高级和初级教师的互补专业知识，以跨学科的方式解决这一复杂的挑战。参与者包括来自不同机构的六名早期职业教师，他们将被整合到跨学科项目中，以发展跨学科研究项目的专业知识。该项目将包括对博士后、研究生和本科生的培训，10-12年级学生参加STEM女生领导力活动，以及高中教师和学生参加植物遗传学和生理学培训。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Non-technical DescriptionThe basic knowledge and understanding of how environmental stressors, such as high temperatures, affect cereal crop production is important for global food security. Rice, a model cereal plant and a major world staple crop, is grown in the southern United States, and is threatened by increased night temperatures that contribute to unstable production, resulting in lower grain yield and quality, which result in decreased market value. This project will identify individual rice lines that are tolerant to high nighttime temperatures and will use a variety of genetic and biochemical techniques to identify potential mechanisms that underlie the ability of these plants to be high temperature tolerant. These mechanisms will be tested in the plant using gene editing technologies to confirm that these mechanisms and thus the underling causative alleles are responsible for the plant's resistance to high nighttime temperatures. Knowing the actual mechanisms will aid breeders to develop new lines that can help decrease the risk of major crop losses due to high temperatures in the future. This project will be a collaborative effort among the University of Arkansas campuses at Fayetteville and Little Rock, Louisiana State University, and Oklahoma State University and will help develop the careers of six early career research faculty, train undergraduate and graduate students, and postdocs. In addition, the projects will build educational resources for STEM at the undergraduate level as well as K-12. Technical descriptionThe japonica rice subspecies is the basis of most US varieties currently in production and have been used in US breeding efforts with other rice introductions from all over the world to select varieties that are tolerant to high night temperature. In this project, a diverse collection of rice lines critical to U.S. production will be screened in the field, including environments differing in night temperature, and replicated under controlled greenhouse conditions, to identify heat tolerant genotypes with contributing genes and novel mechanisms that are of interest to use in improvement of rice and other cereals for their resilience to high night temperatures. The genetic changes or identification of alleles ascribed to the desired phenotypes will be characterized at multi-systems levels: the transcriptome, metabolome, proteome, and the physiological response. Information from these analyses will be integrated into gene regulatory networks that can provide a biological understanding of plant adaptations to the changing environment documented in independent genotypes. Wildtype or mutant alleles identified from the population studies will be validated by transformation and CRISPR/Cas9 mediated allele engineering, followed by phenotypic validation to identify alleles associated with heat tolerance, as proof of concept for use in cultivar development. This Research Infrastructure Improvement Track-2 Focused EPSCoR Collaboration (RII Track-2 FEC) project brings together complementary expertise comprising senior and junior faculty from the University of Arkansas campuses at Fayetteville and Little Rock, Louisiana State University, and Oklahoma State University, to address this complex challenge in an interdisciplinary manner. The participants include six early career faculty from different institutions, who will be integrated into the interdisciplinary program to develop expertise in cross-disciplinary research projects. The project will include training of postdocs, graduate and undergraduate students, participation of 10-12th grade students in STEM girl's leadership events, and of High School teachers and students for training in Plant Genetics and Physiology.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.