Objective
In nature, plants live in complex environments in which they are attacked by a multitude of pathogens and pests. In agriculture this leads to tremendous annual crop losses, representing a value of over 450 billion worldwide. Beneficial associations between plants and other organisms are abundant in nature as well, improving plant growth or aiding plants to overcome biotic or abiotic stress. In the past years, we pioneered research on the complexity of the natural plant immune system that is engaged in interactions of plants with beneficial microbes, pathogens and insect herbivores. We discovered that the plant immune signaling network finely balances the plant¿s response to beneficial and harmful organisms to maximize both profitable and protective functions. As plants have co-evolved with an enormous variety of alien organisms, they harbour a fantastic reservoir of natural defensive mechanisms that until to date remained largely untapped. Here, I propose to mine this undiscovered natural resource in detail, using the Arabidopsis thaliana model system, and an innovative multidisciplinary approach involving a unique combination of state-of-the-art microbial and plant functional genomics, ecogenomics, molecular genetics, cellular biology, computational biology and bioinformatics. The outcomes of the proposed project will provide a detailed understanding of the intrinsic capacity of the plant immune system to simultaneously accommodate mutualists and ward off enemies in order to maximize benefits and minimize damage. Profitably, the discovery of novel plant loci and mechanisms involved in plant immunity will provide multi-faceted possibilities for development of new strategies for sustainable agriculture and resistance breeding of economically relevant crop species.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.
- natural sciences biological sciences genetics
- natural sciences biological sciences molecular biology molecular genetics
- agricultural sciences agriculture, forestry, and fisheries agriculture sustainable agriculture
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Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
ERC-2010-AdG_20100317
See other projects for this call
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Host institution
3584 CS Utrecht
Netherlands
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.