Plants are exposed to all sorts of environmental stresses such as drought, cold, salinity, mechanical wounding or
infections by fungi and other organisms. The perception of these signals and initial responses take place at the
cellular level but it appears that stress signals are subsequently transferred to neighbouring cells leading to co-
ordinated changes in growth patterns and plant organs. This project will involve the collaboration of experts to
increase our understanding of exact signal perception and early responses to extracellular signals in plant cells, as
well as mechanisms to pass signals on to neighbouring cells. The understanding of such mechanisms is important
to help plants grow under difficult environmental conditions.
The project aims to gain further insights into two major problems of stress physiology in plants:
1) the perception of and early responses to stress in plant cells and
2) the mechanisms by which stress signals are passed between cells.
We will adress these problems by application of modern microscopical, cell physiological and molecular biological
techniques and investigate the reactions of plant cells to mechanical pressure, injury and cold stress. Re-
organizations of the cytoskeleton, migration of the nucleus and the role of plasmodesmata, minute channels
between neighbouring plant cells, will be analysed.
The general knowledge of structure and funktions of plant cells as well as better understanding of signal perception
and transduction in plant cells will open new possibilities for biological pest control and more efficient application
of fertilizers.