The second of our posts from ICAR 2013 travel bursary awardees is from Nur Izzati Mohammed Noh, a PhD student in the Signal Transduction Group at the University of Cambridge.
From the 24th until 28th of June I was in Sydney, Australia, for ICAR 2013, and I had a chance to present a poster of my work. That was my first experience attending an international conference and I met a lot of great scientists who have done amazing studies on Arabidopsis. Here are some of the interesting topics that were presented in the conference:
- Ian Small (Western University of Australia) described his group’s studies on PRR (pentatricopeptide repeat) proteins, which are important for plant development. PRRs can recognise a specific sequence present in RNA to control gene expression. Ian’s group has also identified two arginine methylation genes, PRMT10 and PRMT5, involved in autonomous pathway and flowering time regulation. PRMT10 is a plant specific protein, whereas PRMT5 has a close homolog of human PRMT5. Together, PRMTs control plant development by regulating RNA splicing.
- Gonzalo Estavillo (Australian National University) gave a talk on retrograde signalling and drought. It is known that organelles can act as sensors in order to tolerate environmental stress. However, how organelles are involved in this process is a big question to be answered. Estavillo’s group propose that plants can tolerate drought stress via SAL1 and PAP interaction. (more…)
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