Welcome to Laboratory of Plant Functional Analyses (Misato's Lab)!

April 2023, the spring of the fifth year of Misato's lab has arrived.

We spent busy time in last year with the resumption of domestic and international exchanges, including international travel, international guest visits, and lab exchanges. At the end of last year, three students received their master's degrees, two of whom left the lab. In addition, two postdoctoral fellows took up new positions and left the lab; I believe that our lab has begun to enter a new phase.

New members from Japan and abroad will join us in FY2023.
We will work hard to further promote our research activities in order to explore "Wonders of plants"!

 

Fifth year of Misato Ohtani's lab has been started!

 

In this laboratory,  we aim to obtain molecular information on how plants sense and react to environmental conditions, to control flexibly cell proliferation and differentiation for an active control of individual.

 

June 1st, 2023

Congratulation!

Dr. Arae received Young Investigator Paper Award (DGD Award)(JSDB)for Arae et al. (2022) DGD 64 (1), 5-15.

https://en.jsdb.jp/about_awards.html

 


Mar 23, 2023.
2023 Degree Conferral Ceremony was held.

 

Three Master course  students were successfully obtained their master's degrees in March 2023. One of them will continue on to a doctoral program, and two will leave the lab. They had a lot of challenges, but they all made it to the end of their studies. We wish them all the best for the future!

Sep 22, 2022 Natsu Takayanagi(D1)obtained Excellent Poster Award in the 4th meeting of young researchers in Plant-Structure-Opt (MEXT-JSPS)

 

Sep12, 2022 Ami Takeuchi(D1)obtained Student Award (JSPB) 2022

https://www.jspb.jp/2022student_award/

 

 

 

2022. 8. 3.  Original Article Paper Accepted!

Shikakura Y, *Oguchi T, Yu X, Ohtani M, Demura T, Kikuchi A, Watanabe KN (2022) Transgenic poplar trees overexpressing AtGolS2, a stressresponsive galactinol synthase gene derived from Arabidopsis thaliana, improved drought tolerance in a confined field. Transgenic Res in press

 

2022. 7. 16.  Original Article Paper Accepted!

Umeda-Hara C, Iwakawa H, Ohtani M, Demura T, Matsumoto T, Kikuchi J, Murata K, Umeda M (2022) Tetraploidization promotes radial stem growth in poplars. Plant Biotechnol. in press

 

2022. 5. 13.  Original Article Paper Accepted!

Takayanagi N, Mukai M, Sugiyama M, and Ohtani M (2022) Transcriptional regulation of cell proliferation competence-associated Arabidopsis genes, CDKA;1, RID1, and SRD2 by phytohormones in tissue culture. Plant Biotechnol. in press

 

 

Special Focus Issue「The Biomechanics of Plant Cell Walls」

in Plant & Cell Physiology,

 A special issue of "The Biomechanics of Plant Cell Walls," in which Ohtani participated as a guest Editor, has been published as the December 2021 issue of Plant & Cell Physiology. It includes original papers related to our laboratory. The special issue also provides an overview of the latest developments in plant cell wall research.

https://academic.oup.com/pcp/issue/62/12

Dec 9, 2021 Original Article Paper Accepted!

Arae T, Nakakoji M, Noguchi M, Kamon E, Sano R, Demura T*, Ohtani M* (2021) Plant secondary cell wall proteome analysis with an inducible system for xylem vessel cell differentiation. Dev. Growth Differ. in press

 

 

Nov 20, 2021 Fuma Ikuta(M2)obtained Excellent Presentation Award in the 15th meeting of plant cell wall network

 

Sep 29, 2021 Review Paper Accepted!

Kamon E, Ohtani M* (2021) Xylem vessel cell differentiation: a best model for new integrative cell biology? Curr Opin Plant Biol

 

Sep 22, 2021 Natsu Takayanagi(M2)obtained Excellent Poster Award in the 3rd meeting of young researchers in Plant-Structure-Opt (MEXT-JSPS)

 

 

Dec 2020 Special Issue "Approaches for strategies of mechanical optimization in plants" was published in Plant BiotechnologyMisato Ohtani was involved in as an Editor in this special issue!

https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/browse/plantbiotechnology/37/4/_contents/-char/en

Sep 2019 Special Focus Issue "RNA-mediated Plant Behaviour" was published in Plant & Cell Physiology

Misato Ohtani was involved in as an Editor in this focus issue!

https://academic.oup.com/pcp/issue/60/9

Totipotency of Plant Cells

One of characteristics of plant cells is “totipotency”. This nature can be recognized through, for example, organ regeneration. Now we propose the hypothesis that RNA metabolism would support the expression of totipotency in plant cells. These RNA metabolism studies will be deepened, by further analysis of molecular mechanisms controlling the cell potency of plants.

Biopolymer Dynamics

Generally mobility of plants is quite low, thus plant cells should constantly response to changes in environmental factors, to maintain the homeostasis of cell function. We elucidate roles for biopolymer dynamics in environmental response of plants, focusing on RNA (the essential molecules for gene expression) and cell walls (the first barrier against the external environment for plant cells).

Woody Biomass Biosynthesis

Aggravated environmental problems strongly require us to change the style of social activities. Towards a sustainable social system, we promote to understand the biosynthesis of woody biomass. The understanding of secondary cell wall biosynthesis as a system and the explore of evolutionary origin of secondary cell walls are pursued by comparative- and trans-omics approaches.