About

• Department Affiliations:
• Biology

• Other UNC PhD Program Affiliations:
• Biological and Biomedical Sciences

My Research

Our lab wants to understand how signaling pathways control stem cell niche function and development in plants and to understand how these pathways are shaped by evolution and environmental cues. As in animals, plant stem cells reside in stem cell niches (SCN), known as meristems, where cell-to-cell communication is critical for SCN homeostasis. Root SCNs located at root tips drive below ground plant growth, while shoot SCNs located at growing shoot tips generate all above ground tissues, including stem, vascular tissues, flowers, and seeds. Unlike in animals, new plant SCNs are continuously generated from differentiated tissues as the plant grows, allowing for extensive developmental plasticity in the final plant body plan. This plasticity is linked to environmental cues like light and temperature through poorly understood mechanisms.

We focus on peptide signaling pathways that regulate diverse SCN functions in roots and shoots. Key questions we are interested in include understanding how peptide receptors signal, how signaling controls cell proliferation and differentiation, how SCNs integrate endogenous and exogenous signals, and how these are molded by evolution to alter plant form and function. Our lab uses the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana and other plants. We use genetics, biochemistry, live imaging, omics, cell biology and genome editing to uncover the function of genes and proteins in these signaling pathways. We seek to provide a lab environment that is supportive, fun, tolerant, and collaborative and that helps all individuals excel scientifically.