Impact of specific long-chain-acyl-CoA synthetases on plant development

• Applicant: Dr. Martin Fulda
• Subject Area: Plant Biochemistry and Biophysics
• Term: from 2011 to 2015
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 187465453

Despite a wide variety of high-throughput molecular techniques and bioinformatics the understanding of the biological role of individual proteins is still far from being complete. The proposed project aims on contributing knowledge to such uncharacterized proteins involved in the fatty acid metabolism. Specifically, the role of certain long-chain-acyl-CoA synthetases (LACS) on the plant lipid metabolism will be evaluated. Changes in lipid composition provoked by certain LACS mutant alleles seem to impact plant morphology and plant development substantially. In this project we will focus on LACS genes with so far uncharacterized biological roles. By means of mutant analyses we will dissect the contribution of individual LACS to changes in lipid metabolism finally affecting plant development. Mutant phenotypes will be analyzed with respect to biochemical changes of the lipid composition and to the impact on structure on cellular and tissue level. The overall goal will be the establishment of a model explaining the molecular basis for the observed morphological phenotypes.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants