Project description
Hybrid plants for sustainable agriculture and forestry
Modern agriculture relies on new crops and techniques to improve yields, disease resistance, and tolerance to drought and extreme temperatures. One example is plant grafting, a process where two plants are cut and joined together. At the graft junction, hybrid cells are formed between the two plants, enabling distant plant species to hybridise. However, cell hybridisation remains poorly understood. In this context, the ERC-funded GRAFT-ABLE project aims to use advanced microscopy, sequencing, and grafting techniques to explore how cells in plants hybridise. The findings will lead to the development of methods for isolating and cultivating hybrids, potentially resulting in the creation of superior plants for agricultural and forestry purposes.
Objective
Modern agriculture depends on developing new crops and techniques to enhance yields, disease resistance and tolerance to drought and extreme temperatures. One such innovation has been the development of plant grafting whereby two plants are cut and joined together to combine their best properties. At the graft junction, cells from the different plants expand, divide and in some instances exchange genetic material including DNA. This exchange of DNA forms hybrid cells between the two plants. Our ability to graft distantly related plants is growing and thus, hybridisation at the graft junction is a promising means to allow plants to hybridise that normally could not. However, how tissues fuse and cells hybridise remains largely unknown, and our ability to exploit this hybridisation technology remains limited
In GRAFT-ABLE, I will consolidate my expertise in plant grafting and build a dedicated team to identify the processes and molecular players that contribute to tissue fusion and DNA exchange at the graft junction in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana. Using a combination of advanced microscopy techniques, single cell sequencing and genetic screens, I will identify how cells hybridise and determine which genes and cells contribute to hybrid cell formation. Using this information, I will deploy chemicals and novel grafting techniques to enhance hybridisation rates and to develop transgene free methods for hybrid formation. Graft hybrids will be generated from Arabidopsis thaliana to its relatives and also from various agriculturally relevant species.
By unravelling the molecular and developmental processes that occur at the graft junction, GRAFT-ABLE will provide fundamental information to better understand how different plants fuse tissues, how hybrids form and develop novel methodologies to isolate and grow hybrids. Such hybrids could overcome breeding barriers and combine genomes from two species to form superior plants for agriculture and forestry.
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: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- natural sciences biological sciences genetics DNA
- natural sciences physical sciences optics microscopy
- agricultural sciences agriculture, forestry, and fisheries agriculture
- natural sciences biological sciences genetics genomes
- agricultural sciences agriculture, forestry, and fisheries forestry
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Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
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.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
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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.
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Call for proposal
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Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2023-COG
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750 07 Uppsala
Sweden
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