Advances Issue 13 JOHN INNES CENTRE and SAINSBURY LABORATORY SUMMER 2009 E XC E L L E N CE I N R E SE A R C H A N D TRAI NI NG I N PLANT AND MI CROBI AL S CI E N CE Chris Lamb honoured Chris Lamb FRS has been awarded a CBE for services to plant sciences in the Queen's Birthday Honours List. After completing a PhD at Cambridge University, he became a research fellow at the University of Oxford and in 1982 he moved to the Salk Institute in California, rising to Director of the Plant Biology Laboratory, before becoming the Director of the John Innes Centre in 1999. Since joining JIC he has led the continued focus on excellence in science and helped to promote Norwich as a major centre for scientific research, especially in the areas of food, environment and health. A key part of this has been training young scientists - equipping the next generation with the skills to meet the challenges faced by society. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2008. BRASSICAS An international team of scientists has made a major advance in understanding the problem of pod shatter in Brassica crops such as oilseed rape. Pre-harvest pod shatter is a useful mechanism for seed dispersal in nature but is one of the biggest problems in farming oilseed rape. As well as losing 10-25% of valuable seeds, it results in runaway `volunteer' seedlings that contaminate the next crop in the rotation cycle. Using the related model plant Arabidopsis, Lars Østergaard and JIC colleagues Post-Doctoral Fellow Karim Sorefan and Post-Doctoral Training Fellow Thomas Girin have discovered that by artificially producing the plant hormone, auxin, in a specific region of the fruit, they can stop the fruit opening, completely sealing the seeds inside. The process now needs to be refined for use in agriculture to reduce seed loss but still allowing them to be easily harvested. It is already known that proper plant development, such as organ growth and patterning, requires specific hormones to accumulate in specific regions. But this work demonstrates for the first time in both plants and animals, that also absence of a hormone can be important for cell fate determination. JIC scientists are also researching genetic solutions to reduce pod shatter and to improve breeding of the crop. New EU funding to Robert Sablowski and Lars Østergaard focuses on a key gene, RPL, required for the development of the replum, which is involved in the opening process of the fruit to release seeds. Continued on page 2 Shatter resistant Working with Parliament Chris Lamb presented a talk on Food Security at a meeting in London of the Parliamentary & Scientific Committee. This has been published in `Science in Parliament'which keep Members up-to-date with scientific affairs. Disease and Stress Biology PhD student Ellen Colebrook has completed a 3 month BBSRC Parliamentary Fellowship. While most students spend their Fellowship researching and writing a briefing note on a science subject, she had the opportunity to work with the Secretariat of the then Innovation, Universities, Science and Skills Select Committee. Highlights included preparing a pre-appointment hearing with the Chair-elect of the BBSRC Council, and working with the Members to prepare questions to put to the Minister for Science and Innovation. w w w . j i c . a c . u k w w w . t s l . a c . u k