Announcement about recruitment to the Poznań Doctoral School of the Institutes of the Polish...

1. Position type: doctoral student

2. Number of vacancies: 1

3. Discipline: biological sciences

4. Application deadline: 16/12/2022

5. Detailed information about recruitment process can be found on the website: https://www.idpan.poznan.pl/index.php/doctoral-school-pds-ipas/documents-for-candidates-and-ph-d-students and https://psd-ipan.ichb.pl/index.php/en/home/

6. Research topic: Why cells become smaller to survive? Analysis of tobacco BY2 cells adapted to osmotic and salt stress in the search of key regulatory factors between energy management, molecular homeostasis and the size of the chronically stressed plant cells.

7. Principal Investigator / Research group: dr. Agnieszka Szuba, Department of Genetics and Environmental Interactions

8. Project Description:

Key Words: adaptation to osmotic stress, molecular status of the plant cell, cell size regulation, 'the new homeostasis state', mitochondria, advanced microscopic imaging, protein turn-over, ribosomes, proteomics, metabolomics, trancriptomics, energy

Project details:

Our latest results of transcriptomic analysis for adapted BY2 cells showed, that the molecular status of plant cells adapted to ionic- and non-ionic stress condition was surprisingly similar to controls. Our planned experiments will verify the existence of the state of ‘new molecular homeostasis’ and discover how it developed.

Numerous phenotypic observations revealed that plants living in chronic stress conditions are smaller. It is postulated that this decrease in size/mass is a ‘cost’ of life in stress conditions paid to prevent death. We are very interested in this cost. In our project we plan to study the intensity of energy-consuming processes of protein turnover as a marker of the molecular stability of adapted cells as well as the factor believed to be directly connected with the regulation of cell size.

In our opinion, the most interesting question is: How the coordination between the molecular status – energy management – cell size regulation differ between adapted, stressed and ‘control’ plant cells. Such knowledge will allow us to find out what is really crucial for the successful adaptation process.

We have an unique experimental system of tobacco BY2 suspension cells gradually adapted to ionic and non-ionic osmotic stress in 2005-2006 y. (suspension cultures will be grown at the Faculty of Biology of the Adam Mickiewicz University, at our partners as part of a scientific consortium).

We plan high-throughput analyzes at the level of the transcriptome, proteome and metabolome (but also transcriptome) made on BY2 tobacco cells and cell fractions. The results of the research planned to be performed by the doctoral student will be analyzed in conjunction with the microscopic results obtained in parallel by our partners from the Faculty of Biology, AMU.

We will also carefully analyze oxidative stress and anti-ROS response as well as the energetic status of analyzed adapted to stress conditions, re-adapted to control conditions and control (kept all the time in control conditions) tobacco BY2 cells.

We expect that the research results will allow them to be disseminated in the best international journals and will be the basis of the doctoral dissertation, and will also be presented at international conferences.

As part of the project, we offer the opportunity to conduct research in an experienced research team (as part of a Institute of Dendrology Polish Academy of Sciences/Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry Polish Academy of Sciences/Faculty of Biology, Adam Mickiewicz University consortium). We provide support in carrying out works based on the lasts research directions and modern research equipment and experience in publishing research results in leading scientific journals. We create an atmosphere of good cooperation and open exchange of ideas.

The tasks of the doctoral student: The doctoral student will participate in laboratory work mainly in the field of proteomics, metabolomics and transcriptomics, including the isolation and analysis of proteins and metabolites from cells (and cell fractions, in particular from mitochondria, isolated in cooperation with a consortium partner, Faculty of Biology, AMU) of tobacco suspensions BY2. The doctoral student will participate in modern analyzes of tandem mass spectrometry (in close cooperation with the consortium partner: IBCh PAS). The doctoral student will participate in the processing and the publication of the received. As part of the project, participation of the PhD student in international scientific conferences and participation in specialized training in the field of Bio-IT is planned.

Research and doctoral dissertation will be conducted under research project: “Why cells become smaller to survive? Analysis of tobacco BY2 cells adapted to osmotic and salt stress in the search of key regulatory factors between Energy management, molecular homeostasis and the size of the chronically stressed plant cells” UMO-2020/39/B/NZ9/03336, OPUS-20, National Science Center, Poland.

Additional information may be provided Principal Investigator: [email protected]