John Innes Centre

Prof Caroline Dean

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Curriculum Vitae

  • 1978 BA Hons Biology, University of York
  • 1982 DPhil University of York
  • 1983 Post-doc toral fellow Advanced Genetic Sciences CA
  • 1988 Project leader, John Innes Centre
  • 1999 Associate Research Director, John Innes Centre

Caroline Dean

Project Leader

Cell & Developmental Biology

Contact details

caroline.dean@bbsrc.ac.uk

Research interests

The Dean lab is investigating the molecular control of flowering time, focusing specifically on the acceleration of flowering by prolonged cold, a process known as vernalization.

Using Arabidopsis thaliana as a model system we are analysing genes conferring a vernalization requirement and are identifying and characterising genes that mediate a vernalization response. A central regulator in flowering and vernalization is FLC, which represses the floral transition. We are focusing on pathways that promote and repress FLC expression. It turns out that FLC regulation provides an excellent system in which to define conserved chromatin regulatory pathways. We aim to understand the molecular basis of these different pathways, how their interaction antagonistically regulates a common target and how this interaction changes throughout the life-cycle and during the evolution of different flowering variants.

We plan to translate knowledge emerging from this system into manipulating vernalization in different plants, focusing on Brassica (collaboratively with Judith Irwin) and wheat and barley (collaboratively with David Laurie).

Recent Publications

Liu F., Marquardt S., Lister C., Swiezewski S., Dean C. (2010)
Targeted 3' processing of antisense transcripts triggers arabidopsis FLC chromatin silencing
Science 327 (5961) 94-97
Choi J., Hyun Y., Yun H. I., Yun J. Y., Lister C., Dean C., Amasino R. M., Noh B., Noh Y. S., Choi Y. (2009)
Resetting and regulation of flowering locus c expression during arabidopsis reproductive development
The Plant Journal 57 (5) 918 - 931
DOI:10.1111/j.1365-313X.2008.03776.x
Geraldo N., Baurle I., Kidou S. K., Hu X., Dean C. (2009)
FRIGIDA delays flowering in Arabidopsis via a cotranscriptional mechanism involving direct interaction with the nuclear cap-binding complex
Plant Physiology 150 (3) 1611-1618
Manzano D., Marquardt S., Jones A. M., Baurle I., Liu F., Dean C. (2009)
Altered interactions within FY/AtCPSF complexes required for Arabidopsis FCA-mediated chromatin silencing
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 106 (21) 8772-7
Swiezewski S., Liu F., Magusin A., Dean C. (2009)
Cold-induced silencing by long antisense transcripts of an Arabidopsis polycomb target.
Nature 462 (7274) 799-802
DOI:10.1038/nature08618
De Lucia F., Crevillen P., Jones A. M. E., Greb T., Dean C. (2008)
A PHD-polycomb repressive complex 2 triggers the epigenetic silencing of FLC during vernalization
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA 105 (44) 16831-16836
Pien S., Fleury D., Mylne J. S., Crevillen P., Inze D., Avramova Z., Dean C., Grossniklaus U. (2008)
Arabidopsis Trithorax1 dynamically regulates Flowering Locus C activation via histone 3 lysine 4 trimethylation
Plant Cell 20 (3) 580-588
Sheldon C. C., Hills M. J., Lister C., Dean C., Dennis E. S., Peacock W. J. (2008)
Resetting of FLOWERING LOCUS C expression after epigenetic repression by vernalization
Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences USA 105 (6) 2214-2219