Obiettivo Food security is one of the biggest challenges of our century. Climate change and an increasing human population call forcrop plants that are resistant to abiotic stresses, such as heat and drought while maintaining high productivity and nutritionalvalues. This will require rational strategies for metabolic engineering of crop plants. Fundamental to this engineeringchallenge is the modelling of leaf metabolism. Leaves are the main site of photosynthesis and therefore the interface wherecarbon from the environment is assimilated to synthesise and maintain cellular components. Plants have developed differentmechanisms to fix carbon: C3, C4, and Crassulacean Acid Metabolism (CAM). While C3 photosynthesis is the mostwidespread form, the latter two exhibit higher efficiency at higher temperatures or drought, respectively. Current large-scalemetabolic models lack a mathematical description of processes on the interface between the environment and the leaf. Toaddress this problem, I intend to devise a computational approach that couples genome-scale metabolic modeling to theenvironment by explicitly modeling gas-water exchange. These multi-layer models will help address fundamental questionsabout the operation of C4 photosynthesis and CAM. The workplan comprises two research objectives: 1) Coupling CO2-water gas exchange models with multi-timestep diel models: The CO2-water exchange models will allow changingenvironmental conditions during the diel cycle (e.g. temperature and humidity cycles) to be coupled to the behavior of themetabolic models. These environment-coupled models will be used to address the second research objective: 2) Model-driven studies of C4 and CAM metabolism: The extended diel models will be used to investigate metabolic engineeringstrategies for improved productivity under high temperatures (e.g. by introducing C4) and to understand the trade-offbetween productivity and water-use efficiency in both C3 and CAM plants. Campo scientifico engineering and technologyindustrial biotechnologymetabolic engineeringsocial scienceseconomics and businesseconomicsproduction economicsproductivitymedical and health scienceshealth sciencesnutritionnatural sciencesearth and related environmental sciencesatmospheric sciencesclimatologyclimatic changesnatural sciencesbiological sciencesbotany Parole chiave metabolic modeling leaf metabolism in-silico C3 photosynthesis C4 photosynthesis Crassulacean Acid Metabolism heat tolerance drought tolerance Flux Balance Analysis biophysical model Programma(i) H2020-EU.1.3. - EXCELLENT SCIENCE - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Main Programme H2020-EU.1.3.2. - Nurturing excellence by means of cross-border and cross-sector mobility Argomento(i) MSCA-IF-2017 - Individual Fellowships Invito a presentare proposte H2020-MSCA-IF-2017 Vedi altri progetti per questo bando Meccanismo di finanziamento MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF) Coordinatore THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD Contribution nette de l'UE € 183 454,80 Indirizzo WELLINGTON SQUARE UNIVERSITY OFFICES OX1 2JD Oxford Regno Unito Mostra sulla mappa Regione South East (England) Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire Oxfordshire Tipo di attività Higher or Secondary Education Establishments Collegamenti Contatta l’organizzazione Opens in new window Sito web Opens in new window Partecipazione a programmi di R&I dell'UE Opens in new window Rete di collaborazione HORIZON Opens in new window Costo totale € 183 454,80