The role of RNA structures in plant response to temperature

全球变暖有可能广泛抑制农业产量。全球变暖的影响之一是极端温度的发生增加，这些极端温度对我们的作物特别具有破坏性。根据全球年度农业报告，由于全球气候变化，到2050年，农业产量将下降20%。以前的研究也表明，每增加1度，粮食产量就会下降10%。因此，为了避免全球变暖造成的严重粮食危机，重要的是要使我们的作物适应极端的温度变化。我的研究方向是了解植物如何对极端温度做出反应，以及如何调节这种反应，使植物更好地适应气候变化。以往的科学研究大多集中在DNA水平的基因调控上，然而，这一水平的调控既不是特别迅速，也与蛋白质水平没有很好的相关性，而蛋白质水平是基因调控的关键输出。我提议的研究是探索基因表达的调控如何在RNA水平上发生，这可能是快速的，并且与蛋白质水平更直接相关。与DNA相反，RNA非常灵活，对不同的细胞条件，特别是不同的温度更敏感。例如，RNA在寒冷条件下形成更多的碱基配对结构，同时在较高温度下保持单链性。RNA结构的这些变化将对控制蛋白质水平的一系列过程产生不同的影响，例如核糖体结合，RNA加工和RNA稳定性。通过利用RNA结构的这种灵活性，植物可以通过蛋白质水平的变化快速可逆地适应不同的温度条件。我提议的研究是探索特定温度下的RNA结构，以实现由RNA结构变化控制的基因调控模式。我以前的工作已经开发了一种新颖而强大的平台，可以在超过10，000个基因的高分辨率下测量体内RNA结构。我提出的研究是比较不同温度条件下全球RNA结构的差异。这将使我能够识别具有不同温度控制结构的RNA，这些RNA可能直接调节基因表达，即推定的RNA温度计。我提出的研究将为植物基因调控的研究开辟一种新的方法。该方法也可应用于其他非生物胁迫，如干旱胁迫、机械胁迫、水分胁迫等，以及生物压力。一个用户友好的基于Web的服务器的相应的生物信息学工具包将建立在我建议的研究分析，预测和可视化的个人感兴趣的RNA结构。

Global warming has the potential to widely suppress agricultural yields. One of the effects of global warming is an increased occurrence of temperature extremes and these are particularly destructive of our crop plants. According to the global annual agriculture report, agricultural yields will drop by up to 20% by the year 2050 due to global climate change. Previous studies have also shown grain yield declines by 10% for each 1 degree increase. Thus, in order to avoid severe food crises caused by global warming, it is important to adapt our crop plants to withstand extreme temperature changes. My proposed research is to understand how plants respond to temperature extremes and how to regulate this response to make plants more adaptable to climate change.Most previous scientific studies have focused on gene regulation at the DNA level, however, regulation at this level is neither particularly rapid, nor does it correlate well with protein levels, which are the key output for gene regulation. My proposed research is to explore how the regulation of gene expression occurs at the RNA level, which can be rapid and more directly correlated with protein levels. RNA, in contrast to DNA, is very flexible and more responsive to different cellular conditions, in particular varying temperature. For instance, RNA forms more base pairing structures under cold conditions, while maintaining single strandedness at higher temperatures. These changes in RNA structure will have differing effects on a range of processes that control protein levels, such as ribosome binding, RNA processing and RNA stability. By taking advantage of this flexibility in RNA structure, plants can adapt to different temperature conditions quickly and reversibly via changes in protein level. My proposed research is to explore RNA structures at specific temperatures to realize modalities of gene regulation controlled by shifts in RNA structure. My previous work has developed a novel and powerful platform to measure in vivo RNA structures with high resolution over more than 10,000 genes. My proposed research is to compare the differences in global RNA structure under different temperature conditions. This will allow me to identify RNAs with different temperature-controlled structures that may directly regulate gene expression, putative RNA thermometers. My proposed research will open up a novel methodology for the study of gene regulation in plants. This methodology can also be applied to other abiotic stresses such as drought stress, mechanic stress, water stress, etc., as well as biotic stresses. A user-friendly web-based server of a corresponding bioinformatics toolkit will be established in my proposed research for analyzing, predicting and visualizing individual RNA structures of interest.