De Storme Lab
LABORATORY FOR PLANT GENETICS AND CROP IMPROVEMENT
Projects
Genetic regulation of meiotic recombination in Arabidopsis thaliana
Genetic variability is a crucial element for plant breeding, as it largely determines the efficiency of crop production. Over the years, innovations in plant breeding have already led to an increase in productivity, but to improve it even further, it is important to find out as much as possible about genetic variability. Genetic variability is created by the exchange of genetic material between parental chromosomes during meiosis, which leads to the formation of crossovers. In general, the total of crossovers is low and the distribution is non-random, which leads to a specific crossover landscape. In this project we study how this specific crossover landscape is created in the model organism Arabidopsis thaliana. We examine which mechanisms are responsible for the formation of the landscape and how large their contribution is.
Unraveling the mechanistic basis of heat-induced meiotic restitution in Arabidopsis
Natural genetic variation in heat-induced meiotic restitution in the Arabidopsis thaliana germplasm, can be exploited to characterize underlying cytological mechanisms and to identify determining genetic factors. This variation may be purely quantitative and attributed to different levels of penetrance of one single cellular defect, but it may also be conferred by various types of cellular defects with resulting 2n spores putatively having a different genetic make-up. A major goal within this project is hence to explore the natural genetic variation in male meiotic stability under heat in an extensive collection of Arabidopsis ecotypes to identify the cellular defects that underpin heat-induced meiotic restitution and to characterize the genetic make-up of resulting 2n pollen. In addition, we also aim to identify the main genetic elements that underpin natural variation in heat-induced meiotic restitution in Arabidopsis and use this as a basis for further preliminary molecular studies to unravel regulatory mechanisms involved. As such, results of this project will contribute to our fundamental understanding of the molecular machinery that regulates the intricate process of meiotic cell division in plants and that mediates meiotic restitution and sexual polyploidization under heat stress.
Identifying genetic factors involved in haploid induction and haploid genome doubling mechanisms in Arabidopsis.
Doubled haploid technology allows fast and efficient production of homozygous lines or inbred line within two generation, which is comparatively very fast from conventional breeding methods. Doubled haploid technology has already shown important applications in the improvement of crop breeding. Haploid induction lines can induced by in vivo and in vitro methods and spontaneous genome doubling allows the production of doubled haploids. Genetic factors and mechanisms involved in the haploid induction are still need investigation to answer several questions. In this project, we aim to identify the genetic and molecular factors impact the efficiency of the haploid induction and haploid genome doubling rate in Arabidopsis thaliana. In addition, from the gained knowledge from Arabidopsis we also aim to discover novel methodologies of doubled haploid technology to apply in some crop species.
