MEIOSIS! The cell division which produces
the cells required for sex; so eggs for the
ladies and sperm for the gentlemen. But thats
in humans, and who cares about humans? I'm
more interested in the sex lives of plants…but
not just any old plant, I'm interested in
the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana., the
lab-rat of the plant kingdom, where meiosis
is responsible for producing eggs and pollen
and could help us to feed the world.
But let me start by giving you a quick whistle
stop tour of meiosis: In each cell we have
two copies of each of our chromosomes: one
inherited from our father and one from our
mother, and its exactly the same in plants.
At the beginning of meiosis, sections of DNA
are exchanged between these two chromosomes
and the cell then undergoes two rounds of
cellular division to generate four sex cells,
each containing half the original number of
chromosomes. These sex cells, for instance
pollen or eggs, then fuse together during
sexual reproduction to generate an embryo
which will regain the original number of chromosomes,
but will have a new 'genetic make-up', and
that’s all thanks to this process of DNA
exchange or, to give it it's scientific name,
DNA recombination. And this leads me to my
research. I'm going to be using a series of
very clever experimental techniques to get
inside these cells undergoing meiosis and
to 'tweak' and 'tinker' with the amounts of
different proteins thought to play a role
in this DNA recombination.
Well, I can tell you're absolutely fascinated
by this, but why should you care?
In a number of very important crop species,
for example wheat and barley, we've found
that recombination is restricted to certain
regions of the chromosomes, inhibiting recombination
in other areas and, therefore, preventing
the whole genetic potential of these crops
from being available to plant breeders. If
I can find a way of altering these recombination
sites then we could translate this knowledge
form humble Arabidopsis to these more important
crops, improving plant breeding techniques
and, hopefully, allowing breeders to produce
bigger, better yielding, hardier crops and
thus, feed the World.
