HORIZON 2020 PROJECT PROPOSAL SUMMARY
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Assoc. Prof. Jan Hejatko
Leader of the research group Functional Genomics and Proteomics of Plants:
http://www.ceitec.eu/ceitec-mu/functional-genomics-and-proteomics-of-plants/rg46
Central European Institute of Technology, Brno, Czech Republic: www.ceitec.eu
E-mail: jan.hejatko@ceitec.muni.cz
Phone: +420 549 49 4165
To use the knowledge of important regulators of hormonal regulations for the
efficient selection of novel oil crop variants with improved biomass and/or oil
production
ISIB-05-2014
Meeting the demand for renewable oil crops as a source of bio-based products
Hormonal regulations for the development of dedicated and optimised industrial oil
crops
12th March 2014
Research and innovation actions
BACKGROUND AND MOTIVATION
Development of oil crops where the full use of the biomass in a cascade approach would be available
is one of the challenges ensuring the effective use of arable land in Europe in a way that would not
compete with the food production. Ours and others’ recent results suggest that plant hormones
cytokinins (CKs) have a large potential in the regulation of economically important traits,
including plant biomass production. Our very recent findings imply the CK-mediated regulation over
plant cell wall composition, particularly lignin content in the model pant Arabidopsis thaliana. Moving
beyond the model species, we have continued our research at oil-seed rape where we recently have
identified the genes (BnCHKs) encoding for putative CK receptors and we have proven the ability of
BnCHK proteins to bind CKs. This work implies existence of mechanisms for CK-mediated
developmental regulations in the oil-seed rape and related oil crops. Based on the preliminary results,
the detailed knowledge of principal regulators involved in CK signalling pathway could be used in the
identification of genetic polymorphisms associated with important traits and useful in e.g. markerassisted breeding of novel oil crop variants with improved biomass production and/or straw
lignin content without raising a conflict of food versus biomass production. Such crops would
allow the full use of the residual biomass production for energy purposes, either through bioethanol or
heat production. Last but not least, the potential of CK regulation for the oil quality would be
explored.
EXPECTED OUTPUTS AND IMPACT
 Identification of important regulators involved in CK-mediated control over e.g. biomass production,
lignin content and oil quality of oil crops
 Knowledge of polymorphic variants of the aforementioned principal regulators useful in the markerassisted breeding approaches for effective selection of improved oil crop variants

contribution to EU energy policy – i.e. conversion of bio-waste into products useful for next
processing without affecting the plant parts suitable for food processing (e.g. oil-seed rape – grains
Masaryk University | IN: 00216224
Central European Institute of Technology
Kamenice 753/5, CZ-62500 Brno, Czech Republic
www.ceitec.muni.cz | info@ceitec.muni.cz
for oil production, biomass for bioethanol production)
We offer the above mentioned idea and our expertise in plant hormone signalling to collaborative
research as a partner of a consortium which intends to apply for such a project. We will introduce a
“new EU Member State” into the project and increase the geographic coverage of the project impact to
Central and Easter Europe. We have also established a well-working collaboration with a number of
Czech SMEs which could be also potential partner(s) of the project.
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
Hejatko, J., Dobesova, R., Dubova, J., Hwang, I., and Ryu, H. (2009a). Method of regulation of
biomass production in plants, DNA sequences and method of preparation thereof. Patent #
300145, M.U.a.P.A.I. Foundation, ed (Czech Republic).
Hejatko, J., Ryu, H., Kim, G.T., Dobesova, R., Choi, S., Choi, S.M., Soucek, P., Horak, J., Pekarova,
B., Palme, K., Brzobohaty, B., and Hwang, I. (2009b). The Histidine Kinases CYTOKINININDEPENDENT1 and ARABIDOPSIS HISTIDINE KINASE2 and 3 Regulate Vascular Tissue
Development in Arabidopsis Shoots. Plant Cell 21, 2008-2021.
Pekarova, B., Klumpler, T., Triskova, O., Horak, J., Jansen, S., Dopitova, R., Borkovcova, P.,
Papouskova, V., Nejedla, E., Sklenar, V., Marek, J., Zidek, L., Hejatko, J., and Janda, L.
(2011). Structure and binding specificity of the receiver domain of sensor histidine kinase CKI1
from Arabidopsis thaliana. Plant J 67, 827-839.
Pernisova, M., Klima, P., Horak, J., Valkova, M., Malbeck, J., Soucek, P., Reichman, P., Hoyerova, K.,
Dubova, J., Friml, J., Zazimalova, E., and Hejatko, J. (2009). Cytokinins modulate auxininduced organogenesis in plants via regulation of the auxin efflux. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A
106, 3609-3614.
Zd'arska, M., Zatloukalova, P., Benitez, M., Sedo, O., Potesil, D., Novak, O., Svacinova, J., Pesek, B.,
Malbeck, J., Vasickova, J., Zdrahal, Z., and Hejatko, J. (2013). Proteome analysis in
Arabidopsis reveals shoot- and root-specific targets of cytokinin action and differential
regulation of hormonal homeostasis. Plant Physiology 161, 918-930.
CEITEC – A BRIEF INTRODUCTION
CEITEC (Central European Institute of Technology) is a joint initiative of six partners to develop a
European centre of excellence. It is being implemented by a consortium of the most prominent
Brno universities (Masaryk University, Brno University of Technology) and other four research
institutes.
The state-of-art instrumentation and technologies will enable interdisciplinary research in the
subjects of life and material sciences on all currently available levels of complexity.
The major source of funding is the European Regional Development Fund, specifically the Operational
Programme Research and Development for Innovations, priority axis 1 – European Centres of
Excellence. The overall budget is € 208 Mio.
CEITEC is based on the synergy of 7 research programmes.
One of the scientific programmes is Genomics and Proteomics of Plant Systems comprising eleven
research groups. It was established with focus on understanding the evolutionary-based strategies of
plant systems to promote their applications in next-generation technologies and medicine.
Masaryk University | IN: 00216224
Central European Institute of Technology
Kamenice 753/5, CZ-62500 Brno, Czech Republic
www.ceitec.muni.cz | info@ceitec.muni.cz