BIOCROPS

GOALS

Plant seaweed-derived biostimulants are changing modern agriculture, as they have the potential to secure healthy and sustainable food production while preserving the environment. Using the biostimulant SuperFifty (SF), we were able to induce protection of model (A. thaliana) and crop plants (maize, pepper, raspberry, tomato) against oxidative stress, drought, and heat, as well as to improve the marketable grade and enhance yield while preserving the nutritional properties of the fruits. However, the molecular and genetic mechanisms behind the induced stress protection and crop enhancement remain unknown. This project aims at identifying genes and molecular mechanisms responsible for stress mitigation, crop quality, and yield enhancement. Three alternative approaches will be utilized for achieving the project aims: 

 Comprehensive transcriptomic and metabolomic profiling using RNA-sequencing and GC/UHPLC-MS metabolomics, respectively, to pinpoint genes, pathways, and metabolites highly regulated during biostimulants-induced stress protection and crop enhancement. The most prominent candidate genes and pathways will be functionally studied by altering gene expression (knockout mutants, genome edited plants) to see how the specific targeted gene changes will reflect stress tolerance, marketable grade, yield, and nutritional properties; 

   In an untargeted approach, large KO mutant collections A. thaliana with genome coverage will be employed to see if the SF-induced stress protection will be abolished in a specific mutant background. This will prove the role of the respective mutant(s) in the SF-regulated stress signalling pathway; 

  Using SF on two large GWAS panels of 300 pepper and tomato lines, we will identify the vegetable crop lines that are most responsive to SF and will link them to the genome data to identify the genes/loci which interact with the biostimulants and are most likely to regulate the positive effects of the biostimulant in vegetable crops.