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Universidade Nacional da Irlanda em Galway -- Ciência sem Fronteiras
PhD Project Template
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Use one form per project
Please complete & submit to international@nuigalway.ie as soon as possible, and by 27/11/2012
In your email, begin the subject line with [SWB] (be sure to use square brackets) to ensure that
your email is filed correctly. Emails will be automatically filed
PI name & contact details:
School:
Dr. Ronan Sulpice
Ronan.Sulpice@nuigalway.ie
School of Natural Sciences
http://www.nuigalway.ie/natural_sciences/research.html
Has project been agreed with head (or
nominee) of proposed registration school?
Yes
Research Centre / group affiliation:
Plant & AgriBiosciences Research Centre (PABC)
www.plantagbiosciences.org
Plant Systems Biology Research Lab
http://www.nuigalway.ie/botany/
http://www.nuigalway.ie/botany/sulpice_home.html
Research group / centre website:
PI website / link to CV:
Brief summary of PI research / research group / centre activity (2 or 3 lines max):
The Plant Systems Biology Lab aims at understanding how plants cope with the fluctuating
environmental conditions they encounter in nature, i.e. understand what are the
genetic/physiological bases of plant robustness. In other words it is about understanding how plants
use fluctuating and unpredictable resources in order to survive and grow.
Title & brief description of PhD project (suitable for publication on web):
REGULATION OF CARBOHYDRATE ASSIMILATION AND GROWTH OF THE AMAZONIAN TREE SENNA
RETICULATA IN RESPONSE TO ENVIRONMENTAL CUES
Collaboration with Pr. Marcos S. Buckeridge – Laboratorio de Fisiologia Ecologica de Plantas
(LAFIECO) - Universidade de Sao Paulo, Brazil
Photosynthetic processes are restricted to the light period and the leaves, but the use of the
photoassimilates produced for growth and metabolic processes occurs during the whole diurnal
cycle and in all plant tissues. Thus, the photoassimilates have to suffice not only for the immediate
demand for growth (from the synthesis and mobilization of sucrose), but also be stored usually as
transitory starch for the demands at night. The proportion of assimilated carbon stored as starch for
the night demands largely varies between species, but also between environmental conditions, this
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Universidade Nacional da Irlanda em Galway -- Ciência sem Fronteiras
regulation still remaining poorly understood. It has been proposed that plants respond in an
acclimatory manner, modifying carbon utilization to minimize harmful periods of carbon depletion,
which usually occur towards the end of the night.
The forests of the Amazonian varzea are seasonal floodplains with a monomodal, predictable
flood-pulse (Junk et al. 1989) and cover approximately 300.000 km2 along the main rivers in the
Amazon basin. The periods of extended flooding can last as much as 210 days per year, with a water
column of up to 6-7 m. This causes drastic changes in the availability of nutrients and oxygen levels.
Despite these adverse growth conditions, Amazonian floodplain forests are highly diverse and
Amazonian trees can be well adapted to the periodical floodings due to the use of different
morphological and physiological strategies. As demonstrated by our Brazilian collaborators on this
project (Dr. Buckeridge lab in the University of Sao Paulo), one important mechanism is the plasticity
of the carbohydrate metabolism (Ferreira et al., 2009; Arenque et al., submitted).
Senna reticulata Irwin & Barneby (Fabaceae) is a pioneer species typical from seasonal
floodplains and is considered one of the most efficient colonizing species of this environment. This
species has been studied for 7 years by Buckeridge´s group, focusing mainly on aspects of carbon
metabolism in experiments with elevated CO2 concentration in relation to the actual concentration
in the atmosphere. One of the key results is about the high capacity of Senna reticulata to store
starch in their leaves and not in the roots as observed before in other species from Amazonian
floodplain, which might allow this species to easily access the carbohydrates necessary for the
synthesis of new leaves when the trees are waterlogged. Starch amounts in Senna reticulata leaves
spam from around 16% of the dry weight at ambient CO2 (390ppm) conditions up to 32% under
elevated atmospheric CO2 (780ppm). Moreover, Senna reticulata has a very high growth and
resprout rates, what allow this species to be used as bioenergy source (e.g. bioethanol production
from starch and/or gasification) for the small and isolated communities in Amazonian region where
it is not possible use electricity from hydroelectric companies. Besides these characteristics, this
species has an unique carbohydrate metabolism that together with high tolerance to flooding and a
high growth rate makes Senna reticulata a model of choice for physiological studies.
Up to now studies have focused on the effect of elevated CO2 and flooding, but Global
Climate Change is likely going to modify as well the temperature and the periods of drought in the
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Universidade Nacional da Irlanda em Galway -- Ciência sem Fronteiras
Amazon area (IPCC, 2007). Therefore, studies involving these variables can be, together with the
elevated CO2 responses, of great importance to build models and help to explain the impacts of
future climate change scenarios on tropical species. By combining the research efforts of Buckeridge
lab in physiological studies with tropical plants in Brazil together with the metabolic/molecular
expertise developed by Sulpice´s lab in Ireland, we expect to improve the understanding of the
influence of the environmental fluctuations induced by the Global Climate Change on the carbon
metabolism and investigate its effects on growth patterns in a tropical environment. Methods used
in the frame of this project will non-exhaustively involve the phenotyping of the plants for the
determination of photosynthesis, growth rates and the use of state of the art methodologies for the
determination of metabolites, enzyme activities and transcripts. To our knowledge, this will be the
first time that such an approach including sophisticated techniques of molecular and metabolomics
techniques will be applied to an Amazonian species in order to evaluate responses to the forecasted
impacts of climate change.
REFERENCES
Arenque, B.C., Grandis, A., Pocius, O., de Souza, A.P., Buckeridge, M.S. Responses of Senna reticulata, a legume tree from
the Amazonian floodplains, to elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration and flooding. Submitted to Plant, Cell and
Environment.
Ferreira, C. D. S., Piedade, M. T. F., Tine, M. A. S., Rossatto, D. R., Parolin, P., Buckeridge, M. S. (2009) The role of
carbohydrates in seed germination and seedling establishment of Himatanthus sucuuba, an Amazonian tree with
populations adapted to flooded and non-flooded conditions. Annals of Botany, v.104, p.1111 - 1119.
IPCC (2007). Climate change 2007: the physical science basis. In: Solomon S, Qin D, Manning M, Chen Z, Marquis M, Averyt
KB, Tignor M, Miller HL (eds). Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessement Report of the
Intergovernamental Panel on Climate Change, Cambridge, UK/New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.Karl &
Trenberth 2003 Modern Global Climate Change
Junk WJ (1989) Flood tolerance and tree distribution in central Amazonian floodplains. In: Tropical forests: botanical
dynamics, speciation and diversity (eds Holm-Nielsen LB, Nielsen IC, Balslev H), pp. 47-64, Academic Press, New
York.
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Universidade Nacional da Irlanda em Galway -- Ciência sem Fronteiras
Unique selling points of PhD project in NUI Galway:
NUI Galway projects should emphasise features that are not typically available in Brazil – specific equipment,
multi-disciplinarity, aspects of structured programme, links with industry, placements, links with other research
groups etc.
The PhD project will strategically position the student for a successful career in plant biosciences and
biotechnology. The Plant Systems Biology Lab publishes in high-impact international journals which improves
the competitiveness of the researchers within the Lab. The Plant Systems Biology Lab is located in the Plant &
AgriBiosciences Research Centre which has a dynamic mix of research groups and researchers, working with
industrial and institutional partners to advance plant and agribiosciences innovations.
The structured PhD program in NUI Galway allows students to get high-quality English language training and
training in additional science skills including statistics, science communication and advanced molecular
biosciences. NUI Galway is one of the top universities in Ireland with almost 18,000 students and 2200 staff,
and has regularly won accolades such as being nominated as the Sunday Times University of the Year. Galway
is a small, safe and friendly city, with a vibrant cultural scene and the largest Brazilian population in Ireland.
Name & contact details for project queries, if different from PI named above:
Please indicate the graduates of which disciplines that should apply:
Biotechnology, molecular biology, genetics, plant sciences, biosciences, systems biology
Ciência sem Fronteiras / Science Without Borders Priority Area:
Please indicate the specific programme priority area under which the proposed PhD project fits- choose only
one (tick box):
Engineering and other technological areas
Pure and Natural Sciences (e.g. mathematics, physics, chemistry)/Physical Sciences (Mathematics,
Physics, Chemistry, Biology and Geosciences)
Health and Biomedical Sciences / Clinical, Pré-clinical and Health Sciences
Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), Computing
Aerospace
Pharmaceuticals
Sustainable Agricultural Production
X
Oil, Gas and Coal
Renewable Energy
Minerals, Minerals Technology
Biotechnology
Nanotechnology and New Materials
Technologies for Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Disasters
Bioprospecting and Biodiversity
Marine Sciences
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Universidade Nacional da Irlanda em Galway -- Ciência sem Fronteiras
Creative Industry
New technologies in constructive engineering
Please indicate which of the following applies to this project (referring to Science Without Borders
arrangements):
Suitable only as a Full PhD (Y/N): _ _Y
Available to candidates seeking a Sandwich PhD arrangement (Y/N): _N
Suitable for either/Don’t know: _____