Dr. Pablo D. Cerdán
Jefe de Laboratorio
Biología Molecular de Plantas Versión en español
Subject
Plants possess a battery of photorecepetors of red, blue and UV light, which allow the perception of the quality and quantity of light. These parameters enable plants to gather information about the most important environmental variables. On one hand, by combining daylight detection and the circadian clock plants anticipate changes in daylenght. If neighboring plants may compete for light, they use red, far-red and blue light photoreceptors to perceive the changes in light quality that are a hallmark of the presence of plant competitors, and respond by elongating stems to escape from shade. Finally, temperature plays an important role. In our laboratory we want to know how plants integrate all this environmental information and guide their development and changes in the life cycle.
Approach
We use a plant named Arabidopsis thaliana. It is a relative of mustard, cauliflower and rape, but it has advantages as a laboratory model. It is a small plant, with a short life cycle and scientists have developed a large amount of genetic tools that allow its manipulation to perform simple experiments that would be hard or even impossible in other plant species
Advances
We have characterized some of the genes that plants use to perceive light and temperature, as well as the integration of such signals, especially in the regulation of flowering time. With this knowledge, we obtained late flowering plants of alfalfa, which show a widening of the harvest time window, and higher forage quality.
Plants possess a battery of photorecepetors of red, blue and UV light, which allow the perception of the quality and quantity of light. These parameters enable plants to gather information about the most important environmental variables. On one hand, by combining daylight detection and the circadian clock plants anticipate changes in daylenght. If neighboring plants may compete for light, they use red, far-red and blue light photoreceptors to perceive the changes in light quality that are a hallmark of the presence of plant competitors, and respond by elongating stems to escape from shade. Finally, temperature plays an important role. In our laboratory we want to know how plants integrate all this environmental information and guide their development and changes in the life cycle.
Approach
We use a plant named Arabidopsis thaliana. It is a relative of mustard, cauliflower and rape, but it has advantages as a laboratory model. It is a small plant, with a short life cycle and scientists have developed a large amount of genetic tools that allow its manipulation to perform simple experiments that would be hard or even impossible in other plant species
Advances
We have characterized some of the genes that plants use to perceive light and temperature, as well as the integration of such signals, especially in the regulation of flowering time. With this knowledge, we obtained late flowering plants of alfalfa, which show a widening of the harvest time window, and higher forage quality.
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