Signaling Pathway Research Unit

The population of the earth is rapidly increasing, setting food security one of the major issues in the world, especially in developing countries. Additionally, climate changes also put a great burden on food production. Environmental stresses, such as drought, high salinity, soil erosion and pollutants are the factors affecting yield and stability of crop production, thereby threatening sustainable agriculture. Our unit has interest in (i) studying the roles of plant growth regulators, including various hormones and polyamines, and their interactions in abiotic stress responses, as well as (ii) translational genomics aiming to enhance crop productivity under adverse environmental stress conditions.

Research Fields

Biology & Biochemistry / Molecular Biology & Genetics / Agricultural Sciences / Plant & Animal Science / Environment & Ecology

Research Subjects

• Molecular elucidation of cytokinins and cytokinin signaling in drought and salt stress responses
• Co-operative functions of brassinosteroids and polyamines in heavy metal stress responses
• Functional genomics of food crops for improvement of the crop productivity in adverse conditions

Publications

1. Osakabe Y, Yamaguchi-Shinozaki K, Shinozaki K, Tran LS.
   "Sensing the environment: key roles of membrane-localized kinases in plant perception and response to abiotic stress."
   J Exp Bot 64:445-58 (2013).
2. Le DT, Nishiyama R, Watanabe Y, Tanaka M, Seki K, Ham HL, Yamaguchi-Shinozaki K, Shinozaki K, Tran LS.
   "Differential gene expression in soybean leaf tissues at late developmental stages under drought stress revealed by genome-wide transcriptome analysis."
   PLoS One 7: e49522 (2012).
3. Sulieman S, Tran LS.
   "Asparagine: an amide of particular distinction in the regulation of symbiotic nitrogen fixation of legumes."
   Critical Rev Biotech PMID: 22793647, DOI: 10.3109/07388551.2012.695770 (2012).
4. Choudhary PS, Yu J-Q, Yamaguchi-Shinozaki K, Shinozaki K, Tran LS.
   "Benefits of brassinosteroid crosstalk."
   Trends Plant Sci 17:594-605 (2012).
5. Thao NP, Tran LS.
   "Potentials toward genetic engineering of drought-tolerant soybean."
   Critical Rev Biotech, 32: 349-62 (2012).
6. Choudhary PS, Oral HV, Bhardwaj R, Yu J-Q, Tran LS.
   "Interaction of brassinosteroids and polyamines enhances copper stress tolerance in Raphanus sativus."
   J Exp Bot 63:5659-75 (2012).
7. Ha S, Vankova R, Yamaguchi-Shinozaki K, Shinozaki K, Tran LS.
   "Cytokinins: metabolism and function in plant adaptation to environmental stresses."
   Trends Plant Sci 17: 172-9 (2012).
8. Nishiyama R, Watanabe Y, Fujita Y, Le DT, Kojima M, Werner T, Vankova R, Yamaguchi-Shinozaki K, Shinozaki K, Kakimoto T, Sakakibara H, Schmülling T, Tran LS.
   "Analysis of cytokinin mutants and regulation of cytokinin metabolic genes reveals important regulatory roles of cytokinins in drought, salt and ABA responses, and ABA biosynthesis."
   Plant Cell 23: 2169-83 (2011).
9. Le DT, Nishiyama R, Watanabe Y, Mochida K, Yamaguchi-Shinozaki K, Shinozaki K, Tran LS.
   "Genome-wide survey and expression analysis of the plant-specific NAC transcription factor family in soybean during development and dehydration stress."
   DNA Res 18: 263-76 (2011).
10. Mochida K, Yoshida T, Sakurai T, Yamaguchi-Shinozaki K, Shinozaki K, Tran LS.
    "LegumeTFDB: an integrative database of Glycine max, Lotus japonicus and Medicago truncatula transcription factors."
    Bioinformatics 26: 290-91 (2010).