Welcome to Phytogen for October 2021. On the weekend it was World Food day, very significant in this Year of Fruits and Vegetables.

To get you thinking about food, you might like to watch Matt Tucker from the University of Adelaide explaining how crops have developed over hundreds of years of cultivation. The talk provided excellent descriptions of genetic engineering and gene editing.

 

If you haven’t managed to register yet for ASPS2021, this week is the time. Grab a carrot juice or which ever fruit and vegetable juice you like and head to the registration page.

Abstracts are due and Early bird registration applies until this Friday 22nd October. I am sure you will enjoy the spectacle of our states meeting up for the award talks in the middle of the day (12 noon AWST or 2pm AEST) on 25th November 2021.

Five ASPS Award Lectures:

Peter Goldacre Award Presentation & Lecture: Dr Joanna Melonek (University of Western Australia)

Jan Anderson Award Presentation & Lecture: Dr Kim Johnson (La Trobe University)

Best FPB paper Award Presentation and Lecture: Dr Ximeng Li (Western Sydney University)

RN Robertson  Lecture: Professor Christine Beveridge (University of Queensland)

Teaching and outreach Award Presentation & Lecture: Dr Kim Johnson and Associate Professor Monika Doblin (La Trobe University)

 

Please login and check your ASPS membership is up to date. Encourage your colleagues and students to join ASPS. Go to: https://www.asps.org.au/members/join

Tweet to @asps_ozplants your news and upcoming events.

 

 

You can register for ASPS2021 HERE.

Our meeting checklist- use this to develop events that are welcoming, inclusive and equitable

• aim for gender parity in selection organisers/chairs/speakers
• consider career stage, cultural and linguistic diversity when selecting these positions
• include a welcome to country in our activities
• encourage inclusive and respectful behavior
• if possible, include a “noisy room” with talks streamed to this room to enable people to bring kids if needed ensure there are facilities for breastfeeding and the location is included in meeting information

 

Our prizes and awards

When assessing applicants for various ASPS awards, consideration will be given for research output relative to opportunity. This means applicants that have experienced career interruptions due to caring responsibilities or illness will only be assessed relative to opportunity.

Jan Anderson Award A specific award to showcase early to mid-career women plant scientists.

 

“ Getting the Jan Anderson Award was a great recognition of my research to understand plant responses to both elevated CO2 and climate warming, including my contribution to several global datasets. It was important to be recognised by peers in Australia, especially during a tough year for mental healthy (COVID). The award led to an invitation as a discipline representative of Whole Plants for ASPS.”

Dr Kristine Crous, joint Jan Anderson award 2020.

 

 

“The Jan Anderson Award aligns so nicely with the society’s mission to promote Australian plant research in a collaborative and fair manner, by simultaneously pushing for gender equity and fostering the development of early/mid-career researchers. Since receiving this, my first major award as a researcher, I have gained confidence to engage with more funding opportunities and career development programs, which will ultimately help me become a more independent and well-rounded plant scientist. I believe it is essential for awards like this to exist, but also so important to encourage our female (and often reluctant) co-workers, to nominate. Whether career focussed, or divided between career and family, I feel that many women sell themselves short and will greatly benefit from honest encouragement. I wouldn’t have done it without a little push from my own co-workers and collaborators!”

 Dr Crystal Sweetman, joint Jan Anderson award 2020.

“I am truly honoured to win this prestigious award, especially as Australia has so many wonderful female plant scientists. I am completely fascinated by the complex interactions within a plant cell and I am driven by the discoveries we make in the lab. I hope that I can encourage a passion for plant science and be a positive role model for a career in plant research,”

Dr Monika Murcha, Jan Anderson award 2019.

 

“I was so honoured to receive the inaugural Jan Anderson Award in 2018. Delivering the lecture at Combio 2018 to such a warm and supportive community was a true highlight and enabled me to reflect on the fantastic mentors and colleagues I have had. I feel real change is afoot to enable people to balance a research career with all the other great things in life (family, leisure time, community). This is not just to support women to navigate the challenging but rewarding path to a research career but also opens up a different way for everyone to lead successful and balanced lives.”

A/Prof Eloise Foo, Jan Anderson award 2018.

We hope each of you can devote some time to reading the policy and then participate in the mentimeter. It will remain open until our November meeting giving plenty of time to receive your ideas. They are anonymous and will be populated in the window below. You can participate and add as many suggestions as you like.

 

Please keep your ASPS membership up to date and encourage your colleagues and students to join ASPS.

Tweet to @asps_ozplants your news and upcoming events.

 

Welcome to Phytogen for August 2021. Here is an article summarising many National Science Week events throughout August. Thank you all for your contributions and hard work.

National Science Week has officially wrapped up for 2021. This year, the theme for ASPS events was “Plant Science Safeguarding Our Future Food Security”. ASPS kicked off with a “Meet a Plant Scientist” video series, with ASPS members at diverse career stages and representing a wide array of fields of plant science submitting 30s videos introducing themselves and their research – you can still see them all here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCjVjret6uSjalUbDCO8a8jjuJesKZ8y3.

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Frances Sussmilch UTAS,  Prof. Uli Mathesius ANU, and Sabrina Davies UWA, among many in the “Meet a Plant Scientist” video series.

 

 

 

In South Australia, Dr Megan Shelden, Dr Beth Loveys and Dr Georgia Koerber organised a very successful face-to-face event on 22nd August at the Waite Campus, University of Adelaide, with a series of engaging talks and tours explaining the pivotal role plant scientists and agriculturalists play in feeding and clothing us all. This included talks by Megan, Prof. Martin Cole, Prof. Rachel Burton, and PhD candidate Ali Gill, with Sciren running sessions for people to extract DNA from strawberries and make terrariums, and tours of the Waite Arboretum, Plant Accelerator, and TERN Plant and Soil Library.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Prof. Martin Cole talking about Food Security and Dr. Megan Shelden explaining why cereal crops are important.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Prof. Rachel Burton and Dr. Beth Loveys showing people in Adelaide how long their digestive systems are and Ali Gill explaining why hemp is special.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stalls for University of Adelaide’s School of Agriculture, Food and Wine and TERN, Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network, University of Adelaide’s Postgraduates Association at the Waite, the Australian Plant Phenomics Facility and the STEM academy.

In Victoria, Dr. Kim Johnson and Dr. Janet Wheeler shifted events online. They ran an interactive session called “Project Feed 10 billion” with 80 Virtual Schools Victoria, year 8-9 students and 10 teachers on 19th August. The session covered the challenges of feeding the future population with sustainable nutritious foods. Kim and Janet also ran a demonstration to 45 students and 5 teachers from Reservoir Views Primary School where they showed a healthy and less healthy meal going through the digestive system.

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Kim Johnson with “Project Feed 10 billion” from La Trobe University and survey results from interactive session with 80 Virtual Schools Victoria, year 8-9 students.

 

 

In Sydney, Dr. Claudia Keitel, in collaboration with the University of Sydney’s Plant Science and Agriculture academics, staff from the Sydney Institute of Agriculture (SIA) and the University’s Outreach Team, organised a series of talks and interactive activities online on the 20th August, with around 200 participants from 22 schools joining on the day. Talks from Prof. Brent Kaiser, Prof. Daniel Tan, Assoc. Prof. Brian Jones, Prof. Robert Park and Dr. Floris van Ogtrop focused on topics such as future opportunities for products and businesses based on plant protein, the future of cotton production, CRISPR as a 21st century breeding tool, genetic approaches to control plant diseases, and urban agriculture. The activities gave attendees the opportunity to learn how plants grow to produce vegetables we eat, how genetics and environmental conditions influence plant traits, how to fingerprint wheat chromosomes and identify chromosomal fragments introduced from wild relatives with Assoc. Prof. Mary Byrne, Assoc. Prof. Marcus Heisler, Dr. Claudia Keitel, Assoc. Prof. Rosanne Quinnell and Dr. Peng Zhang. You can find more information about this event here: https://www.sydney.edu.au/science/news-and-events/events/future-plants-for-food-security.html.

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Claudia Keitel, addressing 206 participants from 22 schools, in Sydney and Prof. Daniel Tan giving a talk about the future of cotton production.

 

Prof. Brent Kaiser talking about the power of plant protein.

 

 

Queensland University of Technology (QUT) offered a virtual tour of the biology labs – you can check them out here: https://cdn.qut.edu.au/media/qut-science-experience-anz/ and https://my.matterport.com/show/?m=cEBNvWzjjw7.

Researchers from other universities and states recorded videos of talks and lab tours for our YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4-hDpe7OR3kwpMxy4ES6ng). The ACT was represented with fantastic talks from CSIRO and ANU researchers including our President Dr. Peter Ryan, Jess Hyles, Dr. TJ Higgins AO, Dr. Di He, Prof. Uli Mathesius and Dr. Ricky Milne, and Ryan Ruddick from Geoscience Australia (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCjVjret6uSh67u7d2U2B1mGRFARal9mt).

The Byrt Lab at ANU walked us through Agrobacterium-mediated transformation using the floral dip method (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hj0iM3zi6_E&list=PLCjVjret6uSg1pLNehyuIm01NTuIQH7PM). Early career researchers at Southern Cross University, including Dr. Jay Anderson, Master of Science candidate Janelle Schafer, and Dr Priyakshee Borpatra Gohain, each gave great talks about their research (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCjVjret6uSjLV-oQh-iMEwaixzbn1zLm).

Prof. Ros Gleadow from Monash University talked about her research on how plants including sorghum and cassava make cyanide (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6egOt1qNo58&list=PLCjVjret6uSgZYVZ_DhQ8KZq8Vh5NIC9e).

Prof. Tim Brodribb from University of Tasmania showed us why leaves die during drought stress with a video depicting what happens during this process (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0M-sZETVoQ8&list=PLCjVjret6uShxXJbRyx1HIJZbEtyS8tK-).

ASPS President Dr. Peter Ryan in the introduction for the ASPS Science Week 2021 YouTube channel.

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Priyakshee Borpatra Gohain’s talk, within a series from ECRs at Southern Cross University and Prof. Tim Brodribb from UTAS explaining why leaves die during drought.

Members of the Byrt Lab at ANU demonstrating floral dipping for Agrobacterium-mediated transformation.

We will keep the ASPS Science Week 2021 YouTube channel up, so you still have the opportunity to check out any videos you missed.

 

 

 

Registration is now open for our 2021 ASPS hybrid conference on the 25th of November.

 

Hello ASPS members,

The latest  Phytogen is available HERE!

• National Science Week in coming up. See what ASPS has on offer.
• Raise your national profile by submitting a 30 sec video

The latest GPC e-bulletin is available HERE!

 

Welcome to Phytogen for July 2021. Our thoughts are with all of you as COVID-19 is still quite a challenge. On a positive note, the Olympics will be underway tonight with the opening ceremony and for the next couple of weeks, athletes will be striving to be the best in the World.

Next month, several events will be happening for National Science Week from the 14th-22nd August 2021. To reiterate Peter Ryan’s email: Sydney, some regional areas in NSW and possibly Melbourne and Adelaide will be in lockdown during Science Week. We now encourage all speakers to record their talks and maybe even do virtual tours of the labs etc. Please send all files to this email address prior to Science Week: ausplantsci@gmail.com. They will be curated into groups and themes and placed on a YouTube site that has been prepared for everyone to access.

This weekend, while watching the olympics, take a break and record your 30 second video that will be compiled with others into a promotional video for all our events. In your 30 second video please tell us

(1) your name,

(2) your institution,

(3) the piece of plant science research that you are most proud of and

(4) the most pressing plant science research question you want to resolve in the future.

We need your 30 second video files by 25^th July.

Instructions for the 30 sec videos (PowerPoint recording is another option):

–  Log into Zoom and create a new meeting.

–  Select ‘record’. Record yourself (as if in a meeting) explaining the four items above.

–  Then stop the recording and stop the meeting (the file should be on your computer).

–  Open the file location and make sure it is 30 seconds or less. Check the size and clarity – 30 sec video files should be <4 MB so they are easy to email.

–  NB: Zoom allows you to chose a background image relevant to your work (your favorite plant, field site, lab equipment, figure file) – this will make your content more engaging.  Email your video files to ausplantsci@gmail.com  (if it is too large try sending it to Peter.Ryan@csiro.au). Thank you!

– Contact Caitlin Byrt for assistance (Caitlin.Byrt@anu.edu.au)

We are hopeful for in person events and ASPS now has a website to direct people for booking tickets. Click here. Organisers, remember to send details of your events to Janet (Janet.Wheeler@latrobe.edu.au) as they come together.

The theme for all the events we are organising is: “Plant Science Safeguarding Our Future Food Security: By the middle of the century there will be almost 10 billion people on Earth – an awful lot of mouths to feed, especially when a warming climate makes agriculture more challenging. Scientists may save the day by helping crop species adapt and thrive as growing conditions change.

The Australian Society of Plant Scientists is organising visits to laboratories and field sites across the country. Through talks, displays and demonstrations they give rare insight into the challenges faced by farmers, and how food scientists are working to help.”

In the coming weeks, look out for ASPS events posted to the “Find an Event” page on the National Science Week webpage, and also posted to ASPS’s twitter account (@asps_ozplants), which hopefully you are all following. Please be part of the action and post your events too.

Events

registration details for our hybrid meeting in 2021 soon………

Please login and check your ASPS membership is up to date. Encourage your colleagues and students to join ASPS. Go to: https://www.asps.org.au/members/join

Tweet to @asps_ozplants your news and upcoming events.

 

Dear ASPS Members,

June Phytogen can be accessed HERE.

GPC May e-bulletin can be accessed HERE.

Our Society is organising activities during Science Week (14-22 August) to highlight Australian plant science. The theme of our activities is around “Plant Science Safeguarding our Future Food Security”. A series of short, fun and engaging talks and tours will be organised around the country to explain the pivotal role plant scientists and agriculturists play in feeding and clothing us all. We will present some of our research and explain how it will help meet the challenges posed by a growing world population and a changing climate. We’ll emphasise the diversity of plant science. The fact that some of us wear lab coats and rarely grow a plant in soil, while others conduct field trials or predict yields by satellite. The aim of these sessions is to explain what we do, to highlight its importance to society and hopefully to inspire more young people to consider plant science as an exciting career.

 

The purpose of this email is two-fold:

1. to prompt members from universities not listed below to consider organising an event. Contact me for details if you’re tempted.
2. to encourage ASPS members to contact the Science Week coordinators at their own university (below) and offer your assistance. Helpers and speakers do not need to be ASPS members.

 

Contact me if you have questions. Thanks, Peter Ryan

 

Once you have your National Science Week event organised please email Phytogen editor Georgia Koerber  (georgia.koerber@adelaide.edu.au) with a link to your event, a picture and dates  for inclusion in the July issue of Phytogen. June Phytogen can be accessed HERE.

 

Queensland University of Technology – Brett Williams

University of Newcastle – Joseph Pegler (hopefully)

University of Sydney (separate events at the Camperdown and Camden campuses) – Mary Byrne, Brent Kaiser, Robert Park, Marcus Heisler, Claudia Keitel

Australian National University/CSIRO Agriculture and Food – Peter Ryan, Caitlin Byrt, Uli Mathesius

La Trobe University – Kim Johnson, Janet Wheeler

University of Melbourne – Mike Haydon, Michelle Watt

Monash University – Ros Gleadow

University of Adelaide – Megan Sheldon, Beth Loveys, Georgia Koerber, Steve Tyerman, Rachel Burton

Flinders University – Kathy Soole

 

 

 

____________________________________

Dr Peter R Ryan

President, Australian Society of Plant Scientists

Honorary Fellow, CSIRO Agriculture and Food

PO Box 1700

Canberra ACT 2601, Australia

 

Email: Peter.Ryan@csiro.au

Mob: 0468671565

Welcome to Phytogen for June 2021. Plans are well underway for a National ASPS Hybrid meeting on Thursday and Friday 25th and 26th November 2021. More details soon. Meanwhile, in this issue:

• Report from 2020 Jan Anderson Award joint recipient, Dr Kristine Crous, Western Sydney University.

• National ScienceWeek 2021 – 14th-22nd August

• Events

 

 

 

In 2020, we had joint recipients for the Jan Anderson Award. I hope you will enjoy reading about the wonderful work by Kristine Crous from Western Sydney University.

2020 Jan Anderson Award joint recipient – Dr. Kristine Crous, Western Sydney University.

Fig.1: Kristine in tropical rainforest in Australia.

Globally, the average temperature has increased by about 1°C since the Industrial revolution, and Australia has experienced a sustained period of warmer climate over the past 10 years including several of the hottest summers on record. While Australia is one of the drier continents in the world, there is also a lot of biodiversity with a unique set of plant and animal species. We all depend on plant species and their ecosystem services in several ways (i.e. food, clean air, ecotourism) but it is still unclear to what extent these services will change in a future warmer world. Understanding how plant function adjusts to these warmer conditions, in part caused by commensurate increases in atmospheric CO2 has been the focus of my research effort.

The Jan Anderson Award recognised the contributions that I made to understand plant responses to both elevated CO2 and climate warming, insights that contributed to several global datasets (Atkin et al., 2015; Kumarathunge et al., 2019; Smith et al., 2019) and to improve climate feedbacks represented in models (De Kauwe et al., 2013; Jiang et al., 2020).

I have conducted several experiments on Eucalyptus species to understand their physiological responses of photosynthesis (Crous et al. 2013) and respiration to climate warming (Crous et al. 2011, 2017). In an experiment using temperate and tropical provenances of two broadly distributed Eucalyptus species, I discovered that photosynthesis operates closer to the temperature optimum in tropical provenances than temperate provenances (Crous et al. 2018).

Given that there are large uncertainty regarding the temperature responses of rainforest species, I have measured the temperature response curves of photosynthesis and respiration in tropical and temperate rainforests to understand how close they are operating to their thermal optimum and how vulnerable these species are to further climate warming, as part of a DECRA award (Fig. 1).

Not only are Australian rainforests biodiverse, they have a direct link to the past, as many rainforest species have a Gondwanan lineage. So while these rainforests have seen some climate change in the past, the question is how will they cope with future climate warming?

To explore future climate conditions, my work has involved experimental set-ups such as the whole-tree chamber experiment (Fig. 2) or the Eucalyptus free-air CO2 enrichment experiments (EucFACE) (Fig. 3, 4), where elevated atmospheric CO2 or atmospheric warming treatments can be applied on large trees. Because trees have long lifespans, their ability to acclimate will likely be an important factor in determining their future.

Fig. 2: The whole-tree chamber experiment at Western Sydney University in Richmond after completing diurnal measurements (left) and measurements on saplings outside the chambers (right).

Fig. 3. Getting ready to do measurements in the Eucalyptus canopy at the EucFACE experiment at Western Sydney University (above) and measuring photosynthesis (right).

 

Fig. 4. EucFACE, two out of the six plots, view from above.

These large-scale experiments enable many collaborations examining different parts of an ecosystem in an attempt to understand the bigger picture including feedbacks of nutrients on the carbon cycle. While we are developing some understanding on how plants adjust to warmer temperatures, there are still many questions that are unclear, especially around temperature limits and plasticity among different plant species. Most models currently do no account for thermal acclimation of respiration and/or photosynthesis, with the risk of overestimating future responses of carbon uptake.

Recently, I have been elected as a ASPS representative for NSW in the discipline of whole plants. I hope that we can continue to link plant responses from molecular to ecosystem scales back to the whole plant and what it means for its survival, function and growth. Changes in response to biotic and abiotic factors in a plant’s environment drive natural selection which is part of how plants adapt to new conditions.

References

Atkin, O.K., Bloomfield, K.J., Reich, P.B., Tjoelker, M.G., Asner, G.P., Bonal, D., et al. (2015). Global variability in leaf respiration in relation to climate, plant functional types and leaf traits. New Phytologist 206(2), 614-636. doi: 10.1111/nph.13253.

Crous, K.Y., Drake, J.E., Aspinwall, M.J., Sharwood, R.E., Tjoelker, M.G., and Ghannoum, O. (2018). Photosynthetic capacity and leaf nitrogen decline along a controlled climate gradient in provenances of two widely distributed Eucalyptus species. Global change biology 24:4626-4644. doi: 10.1111/gcb.14330.

Crous, K.Y., Quentin, A.G., Lin, Y.S., Medlyn, B.E., Williams, D.G., Barton, C.V.M., et al. (2013). Photosynthesis of temperate Eucalyptus globulus trees outside their native range has limited adjustment to elevated CO2 and climate warming. Global Change Biology 19(12), 3790-3807. doi: 10.1111/gcb.12314.

Crous, K.Y., Wallin, G., Atkin, O.K., Uddling, J., and af Ekenstam, A. (2017). Acclimation of light and dark respiration to experimental and seasonal warming are mediated by changes in leaf nitrogen in Eucalyptus globulus. Tree Physiology 37(8), 1069-1083. doi: 10.1093/treephys/tpx052.

Crous, K.Y., Zaragoza-Castells, J., Loew, M., Ellsworth, D.S., Tissue, D.T., Tjoelker, M.G., et al. (2011). Seasonal acclimation of leaf respiration in Eucalyptus saligna trees: impacts of elevated atmospheric CO2 and summer drought. Global Change Biology 17(4), 1560-1576. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2486.2010.02325.x.

De Kauwe, M.G., Medlyn, B.E., Zaehle, S., Walker, A.P., Dietze, M.C., Hickler, T., et al. (2013). Forest water use and water use efficiency at elevated CO2: a model-data intercomparison at two contrasting temperate forest FACE sites. Global Change Biology 19(6), 1759-1779. doi: 10.1111/gcb.12164.

Jiang, M., Medlyn, B.E., Drake, J.E., Duursma, R.A., Anderson, I.C., Barton, C.V.M., et al. (The fate of carbon in a mature forest under carbon dioxide enrichment). 2020. Nature accepted on Feb 5th 2020.

Kumarathunge, D.P., Medlyn, B.E., Drake, J.E., Tjoelker, M.G., Aspinwall, M.J., Battaglia, M., et al. (2019). Acclimation and adaptation components of the temperature dependence of plant photosynthesis at the global scale. New Phytologist 222(2), 768-784. doi: 10.1111/nph.15668.

Smith, N.G., Keenan, T.F., Colin Prentice, I., Wang, H., Wright, I.J., Niinemets, U., et al. (2019). Global photosynthetic capacity is optimized to the environment. Ecology Letters 22(3), 506-517. doi: 10.1111/ele.13210.

 

National Science Week 2021

Many events (August 14th-22nd 2021) are happening nationally and the ASPS is part of the action.

The theme for all the events we are organising is: “Plant Science Safeguarding Our Future Food Security: By the middle of the century there will be almost 10 billion people on Earth – an awful lot of mouths to feed, especially when a warming climate makes agriculture more challenging. Scientists may save the day by helping crop species adapt and thrive as growing conditions change.

The Australian Society of Plant Scientists is organising visits to laboratories and field sites across the country. Through talks, displays and demonstrations they give rare insight into the challenges faced by farmers, and how food scientists are working to help.”

In coming weeks, look out for events posted to the “Find an Event” page on the National Science Week webpage, and also posted to ASPS’s twitter account (@asps_ozplants), which hopefully you are all following. Please be part of the action and post your events too.

Tweet to @asps_ozplants
July Phytogen will aim to provide a list of the ASPS events happening during August 2021.

 

 

Events

details soon………

Please login and check your ASPS membership is up to date. Encourage your colleagues and students to join ASPS.

Tweet to @asps_ozplants your news and upcoming events.

Hello ASPS members.

The April edition of Phytogen is out now and can be accessed HERE.

Hello ASPS members.

The April edition of Phytogen is out now and can be accessed HERE.