Jian-Kang Zhu | |
---|---|
Born | October 1, 1967 |
Occupation(s) | Plant scientist, researcher and academic |
Academic background | |
Education | B.S., Soils and Agriculture Chemistry (1987) M.S., Botany (1990) Ph.D., Plant Physiology (1993) |
Alma mater | Beijing Agricultural University University of California Purdue University |
Academic work | |
Institutions | Purdue University Shanghai Center for Plant Stress Biology |
Jian-Kang Zhu is a plant scientist,researcher and academic. He is a Senior Principal Investigator in the Shanghai Center for Plant Stress Biology,Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). He is also the Academic Director of CAS Center of Excellence in Plant Sciences. [1]
Zhu is known for his research in plant stress biology,epigenetics and gene editing. He has published over 400 research articles,and is one of the most cited scientists in life sciences. [2] He has several patents for improving plant stress tolerance issued by many countries. [3]
Zhu is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. [4] In 2010,he was elected as a member of the US National Academy of Sciences. [5]
Zhu received a B.S. in Soils and Agricultural Chemistry in 1987 from Beijing Agricultural University. After one year as a graduate student in Peking University,he moved to the United States,where he joined the University of California,Riverside for his M.S. in Botany. After completing his M.S. in 1990,Zhu received a Ph.D. in Plant Physiology from Purdue University in 1993. He completed his postdoctoral training at Rockefeller University. [1]
Zhu taught briefly at Auburn University in 1995 before joining University of Arizona,where he became Associate Professor in 1999 and Full Professor in 2000. In 2004,he left University of Arizona to join University of California,Riverside,as the Presidential Chair Professor in the Department of Botany and Plant Sciences. He became the Jane Johnson Chair Professor at UC Riverside in 2007. From 2004 to 2006,he served as the Director of UC Riverside’s Institute for Integrative Genome Biology. [1]
From 2010 through 2020,Zhu joined Purdue University as Distinguished Professor in the Department of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture,and Department of Biochemistry. From 2009 to 2011,he served as the founding Director of Plant Stress Genomics Research Center at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology. In 2017,he became the Academic Director of Shanghai Institute of Plant Physiology and Ecology,Chinese Academy of Sciences. [6]
Zhu has been a member of the Editorial Board or Editorial Advisory Board of National Science Review since 2013, [7] of Molecular Plant since 2012,of Science China Life Sciences since 2008, [8] and of The Plant Journal 2001-2007. He was a Monitoring Editor (2000-2003) and then Associate Editor (2004-2005) of Plant Physiology,an Associate Editor of Plant Molecular Biology (2000-2015),and of Molecular Genetics and Genomics (2005-2010).
Zhu co-founded FuturaGene in 2002 and served as a scientific advisor for the company until 2008. In 2007,he co-founded D-Helix and continues to serve as a scientific advisor. [9]
In 2012,Zhu established the Shanghai Center for Plant Stress Biology (PSC),which is an international research institute within the Chinese Academy of Sciences. It works to address fundamental questions of plant biology to improve agricultural productivity and sustainability and to mitigate agriculture-related environmental degradation. [10]
Zhu is known for his research on plant stress signaling pathways,epigenetic mechanisms of gene regulation,and precise gene editing technologies in plants. [2]
In the early 2000s,Zhu’s lab discovered the Salt Overly Sensitive (SOS) signaling pathway that plays a central role in ion homeostasis and salt tolerance in plants. [11] Zhu’s lab discovered several important components of abscisic acid (ABA) biosynthesis and signaling pathways,and achieved for the first time the in vitro reconstitution of the core ABA signaling pathway. [12] They also discovered that the Target of Rapamycin (TOR) growth promotion pathway represses ABA signaling and stress responses in unstressed conditions,whereas ABA signaling represses the TOR pathway and growth during times of stress. This discovery revealed a core mechanism through which plants balance growth and stress response and is therefore important for the efforts to breed environment resilient but high yielding crops. [13] Zhu’s lab discovered ABA-mimicking small chemicals that can be applied to plants to activate the ABA pathway to reduce transpirational water loss and to induce the expression of drought responsive genes,thus leading to drought resistance in plants. These chemicals are easy to synthesize,are non-toxic,and much less expensive and more stable than ABA,thus have potential for applications in agriculture,turfgrass and horticultural industries to protect plants from drought stress and benefit the environment by reducing the depletion of available freshwater resources. [14] They also identified several regulatory factors for plant cold stress response. In addition,they discovered a number of plant miRNAs and siRNAs,and elucidated their function in regulating plant stress responses. [15]
In epigenetics,Zhu’s lab discovered the Arabidopsis 5-methylcytosine DNA glycosylase/lyase ROS1 in 2002. ROS1 is the first DNA demethylase (the enzyme initiating active DNA demethylation) established with genetic and biochemical evidence. It initiates a base-excision repair pathway for active DNA demethylation to erase DNA methylation marks and to prevent DNA methylation-mediated gene silencing. [16] Zhu’s lab has found nearly all of the enzymes in the biochemical pathway for active DNA demethylation in plants. They have also identified the first known eukaryotic protein complex that functions in regulating active DNA demethylation,which is important for understanding of the targeting of DNA demethylase for precise control of DNA methylation reprogramming during development,stress responses,aging and diseases including cancer. [17] Furthermore,they discovered several important components of the RNA-directed DNA methylation (RdDM) pathway that controls de novo DNA methylation in plants,and proposed the concept of a methylstat that senses and balances genome-wide DNA methylation and demethylation activities. [18]
From the year 2010,Zhu’s lab has been developing efficient methods for precise gene editing in plants using TALE nucleases and CRISPR/Cas. [19] They developed the first efficient gene targeting method for the model plant Arabidopsis. They have also developed an elegant tandem repeat-HDR (homology-directed repair) approach for efficient sequence insertion and replacement in rice,which is important for crop functional genomics research and breeding. [20]
Plant hormones are signal molecules,produced within plants,that occur in extremely low concentrations. Plant hormones control all aspects of plant growth and development,from embryogenesis,the regulation of organ size,pathogen defense,stress tolerance and through to reproductive development. Unlike in animals each plant cell is capable of producing hormones. Went and Thimann coined the term "phytohormone" and used it in the title of their 1937 book.
Abscisic acid is a plant hormone. ABA functions in many plant developmental processes,including seed and bud dormancy,the control of organ size and stomatal closure. It is especially important for plants in the response to environmental stresses,including drought,soil salinity,cold tolerance,freezing tolerance,heat stress and heavy metal ion tolerance.
DNA methylation is a biological process by which methyl groups are added to the DNA molecule. Methylation can change the activity of a DNA segment without changing the sequence. When located in a gene promoter,DNA methylation typically acts to repress gene transcription. In mammals,DNA methylation is essential for normal development and is associated with a number of key processes including genomic imprinting,X-chromosome inactivation,repression of transposable elements,aging,and carcinogenesis.
In epigenetics,a paramutation is an interaction between two alleles at a single locus,whereby one allele induces a heritable change in the other allele. The change may be in the pattern of DNA methylation or histone modifications. The allele inducing the change is said to be paramutagenic,while the allele that has been epigenetically altered is termed paramutable. A paramutable allele may have altered levels of gene expression,which may continue in offspring which inherit that allele,even though the paramutagenic allele may no longer be present. Through proper breeding,paramutation can result in siblings that have the same genetic sequence,but with drastically different phenotypes.
Dehydrin (DHN) is a multi-family of proteins present in plants that is produced in response to cold and drought stress. DHNs are hydrophilic,reliably thermostable,and disordered. They are stress proteins with a high number of charged amino acids that belong to the Group II Late Embryogenesis Abundant (LEA) family. DHNs are primarily found in the cytoplasm and nucleus but more recently,they have been found in other organelles,like mitochondria and chloroplasts.
RNA polymerase IV is an enzyme that synthesizes small interfering RNA (siRNA) in plants,which silence gene expression. RNAP IV belongs to a family of enzymes that catalyze the process of transcription known as RNA Polymerases,which synthesize RNA from DNA templates. Discovered via phylogenetic studies of land plants,genes of RNAP IV are thought to have resulted from multistep evolution processes that occurred in RNA Polymerase II phylogenies. Such an evolutionary pathway is supported by the fact that RNAP IV is composed of 12 protein subunits that are either similar or identical to RNA polymerase II,and is specific to plant genomes. Via its synthesis of siRNA,RNAP IV is involved in regulation of heterochromatin formation in a process known as RNA directed DNA Methylation (RdDM).
Transgenerational epigenetic inheritance is the transmission of epigenetic markers and modifications from one generation to multiple subsequent generations without altering the primary structure of DNA. Thus,the regulation of genes via epigenetic mechanisms can be heritable;the amount of transcription and proteins produced can be mitigated by inherited epigenetic changes. The less precise term "epigenetic inheritance" may cover both cell–cell and organism–organism information transfer. Although these two levels of epigenetic inheritance are equivalent in unicellular organisms,they may have distinct mechanisms and evolutionary distinctions in multicellular organisms.
N6-Methyladenosine (m6A) was originally identified and partially characterised in the 1970s,and is an abundant modification in mRNA and DNA. It is found within some viruses,and most eukaryotes including mammals,insects,plants and yeast. It is also found in tRNA,rRNA,and small nuclear RNA (snRNA) as well as several long non-coding RNA,such as Xist.
In molecular biology mir-398 microRNA is a short RNA molecule. MicroRNAs function to regulate the expression levels of other genes by several mechanisms.
9-cis-epoxycarotenoid dioxygenase (EC 1.13.11.51,nine-cis-epoxycarotenoid dioxygenase,NCED,AtNCED3,PvNCED1,VP14) is an enzyme in the biosynthesis of abscisic acid (ABA),with systematic name 9-cis-epoxycarotenoid 11,12-dioxygenase. This enzyme catalyses the following chemical reaction
Epigenome editing or epigenome engineering is a type of genetic engineering in which the epigenome is modified at specific sites using engineered molecules targeted to those sites. Whereas gene editing involves changing the actual DNA sequence itself,epigenetic editing involves modifying and presenting DNA sequences to proteins and other DNA binding factors that influence DNA function. By "editing”epigenomic features in this manner,researchers can determine the exact biological role of an epigenetic modification at the site in question.
WRKY transcription factors are proteins that bind DNA. They are transcription factors that regulate many processes in plants and algae (Viridiplantae),such as the responses to biotic and abiotic stresses,senescence,seed dormancy and seed germination and some developmental processes but also contribute to secondary metabolism.
RNA polymerase V,previously known as RNA polymerase IVb,is a multisubunit plant specific RNA polymerase. It is required for normal function and biogenesis of small interfering RNA (siRNA). Together with RNA polymerase IV,Pol V is involved in an siRNA-dependent epigenetic pathway known as RNA-directed DNA methylation (RdDM),which establishes and maintains heterochromatic silencing in plants.
Plants depend on epigenetic processes for proper function. Epigenetics is defined as "the study of changes in gene function that are mitotically and/or meiotically heritable and that do not entail a change in DNA sequence". The area of study examines protein interactions with DNA and its associated components,including histones and various other modifications such as methylation,which alter the rate or target of transcription. Epi-alleles and epi-mutants,much like their genetic counterparts,describe changes in phenotypes due to epigenetic mechanisms. Epigenetics in plants has attracted scientific enthusiasm because of its importance in agriculture.
As a model organism,the Arabidopsis thaliana response to salinity is studied to aid understanding of other more economically important crops.
The TET enzymes are a family of ten-eleven translocation (TET) methylcytosine dioxygenases. They are instrumental in DNA demethylation. 5-Methylcytosine is a methylated form of the DNA base cytosine (C) that often regulates gene transcription and has several other functions in the genome.
Hydraulic signals in plants are detected as changes in the organism's water potential that are caused by environmental stress like drought or wounding. The cohesion and tension properties of water allow for these water potential changes to be transmitted throughout the plant.
RNA-directed DNA methylation (RdDM) is a biological process in which non-coding RNA molecules direct the addition of DNA methylation to specific DNA sequences. The RdDM pathway is unique to plants,although other mechanisms of RNA-directed chromatin modification have also been described in fungi and animals. To date,the RdDM pathway is best characterized within angiosperms,and particularly within the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana. However,conserved RdDM pathway components and associated small RNAs (sRNAs) have also been found in other groups of plants,such as gymnosperms and ferns. The RdDM pathway closely resembles other sRNA pathways,particularly the highly conserved RNAi pathway found in fungi,plants,and animals. Both the RdDM and RNAi pathways produce sRNAs and involve conserved Argonaute,Dicer and RNA-dependent RNA polymerase proteins.
Transgenerational epigenetic inheritance in plants involves mechanisms for the passing of epigenetic marks from parent to offspring that differ from those reported in animals. There are several kinds of epigenetic markers,but they all provide a mechanism to facilitate greater phenotypic plasticity by influencing the expression of genes without altering the DNA code. These modifications represent responses to environmental input and are reversible changes to gene expression patterns that can be passed down through generations. In plants,transgenerational epigenetic inheritance could potentially represent an evolutionary adaptation for sessile organisms to quickly adapt to their changing environment.
Calcium signaling in Arabidopsis is a calcium mediated signalling pathway that Arabidopsis plants use in order to respond to a stimuli. In this pathway,Ca2+ works as a long range communication ion,allowing for rapid communication throughout the plant. Systemic changes in metabolites such as glucose and sucrose takes a few minutes after the stimulus,but gene transcription occurs within seconds. Because hormones,peptides and RNA travel through the vascular system at lower speeds than the plants response to wounds,indicates that Ca2+ must be involved in the rapid signal propagation. Instead of local communication to nearby cells and tissues,Ca2+ uses mass flow within the vascular system to help with rapid transport throughout the plant. Ca2+ moving through the xylem and phloem acts through a “calcium signature”receptor system in cells where they integrate the signal and respond with the activation of defense genes. These calcium signatures encode information about the stimulus allowing the response of the plant to cater towards the type of stimulus.