description
- "Although they are exposed to ever changing and sometimes challenging environmental conditions, higher plants can achieve remarkable metabolic and growth performances. For this, they have to precisely maintain their water status and failure to do so can dramatically impact their growth and ultimately their survival. The control of water flow in the soil-plant-atmosphere continuum and the fine-tuning of water transport within the plant body represent important mechanisms in these respects. Because of their role in soil water uptake, roots are central during these processes. The project for this fellowship is to develop rice as a model for understanding the function and regulation of aquaporins at the cellular level : 1. Aquaporin function and sub-cellular localisation will be investigated in two rice cultivars one upland and lowland, adapted to different watering conditions. Upland rice is grown in rain fed fields prepared and seeded when dry. With respect to this, upland rice can be considered as a classical model cereal, such as wheat or maize. Lowland rice is grown in submersion with water (paddy fields) until ripening. Studying these two types of rice will offer unique opportunity to gain insight about how aquaporin function and sub-cellular localisation can contribute to the adaptation of the plant to two contrasted watering culture systems. 2. As architecture of the rice root is complex, we will consider each of the 4 types of roots in our project. One question will be to better understand which type of roots is more important for water uptake and regulation. 3. The project will allow identifying the subcellular regulation of rice root aquaporins in response to stimuli such as drought and salt. The present project will target a major crop using state-of-the-art knowledge on physiological, molecular and genetic processes obtained in the plant model Arabidopsis."