Overview

I am a cell biologist with an interest in cell polarity; specifically the way plant cells respond to spatial information to guide their immune responses.

The cells of complex plants have an acute awareness of the events occurring immediately beyond their walls and make spatially precise responses to any perceived threat. Potentially pathogenic microbes cause plant defences to focus within a few square microns of the plant cell surface. This process can be summarised as 'pathogen-oriented cell polarisation'. The response is effective against most microbes but successful pathogens evade these counter-measures to establish infection.

My group aims to understand how multiple cell processes are co-ordinated as a system to achieve this important response that underpins the plant immune system.

Qualifications

1998 - 2001 University of Leeds. PhD Genetics.
1995 - 1998 University of Leeds. B.Sc. Hons. Genetics.

Career

7/98 - 9/98 Research Assistant, John Innes Institute, Norwich.
10/01 - 6/13 Senior Research Associate/Postdoctoral Fellow, School of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, Durham University.
7/13 - 10/17 Lecturer in Plant Biology, Biosciences, University of Exeter.
107/17 - Present Senior Lecturer, Biosciences, University of Exeter

Research group links

• Microbial Evolutionary Ecology

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Research

Research interests

Our research aims to understand the response of plant cells to localised pathogen assault. Changes in cell architecture support the plant immune system and an understanding of this response could potentially be exploited to protect key crops.

We are investigating the mechanisms co-ordinating this spatially focused phenomenon using advanced light microscopy combined with a broad range of molecular, genetic and biochemical techniques. We are particularly interested in how the plant-pathogen interface emerges from the co-ordination of several processes:

• Microbe perception
• Cytoskeletal re-arrangement
• Long-range cargo transport
• Exocytosis (cargo delivery)
• Endocytosis (cargo recovery)

We are developing bioimage informatics and modelling approaches to better understand the relationships between these different players in both model plants and key cereals.

Research projects

• Dynamics of vescile delivery to the plant-pathogen interface.
• Live cell imaging of plant-pathogen interfaces in wheat using advanced light microscopy and recombinant fluorescent proteins.

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External Engagement and Impact

Committee/panel activities

Chair UK Biochemical Society ‘Cells’ theme panel.

Primary PI for the GW4-wide Imaging Network (funded by the GW4 communities
programme; http://projects.exeter.ac.uk/ein/).

Invited lectures

Invited guest lecturer, University of Leeds, Level 3 undergraduate plant development, May 2012.

Invited speaker – ‘Untangling Plant Actin’ SEB Annual Meeting, July 2008, Marseille.

Invited seminar speaker, Department of Plant Sciences, University of Oxford, ‘Analysing Actin Remodeling Proteins in Plants Using Reverse Genetics’. February 2007.

Invited speaker – ‘Actin Nucleating Proteins in Plants’ Bioscience 2005, September 2005, Glasgow.

Workshops/Conferences organised

Co-organiser for ‘Imaging Pathogenesis’, SEB Annual Meeting (Sweden 2017).

Co-organiser for Royal Microscopical Society Botanical Meeting (Exeter 2015).

Co-organiser 'Imaging to Mathematical Modelling' (Exeter 2013).

Local coordinator (Durham) for EPSO 'Fascination of Plants Day 2012'.

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Teaching

Level 1:

• NSC1003 - Foundations in Natural Science (lecturer)

Level 2:

• BIO2099 - Molecular Plant Science (coordinator)
• NSC2001 - Frontiers in Science 2 (co-coordinator)

Level 3:

• BIO3096 - Biosciences Research Project
• NSC3001 - Natural Sciences BSc Research Project

Level 4:

• NSC3002 - Natural Sciences MSc Research Project
• NSCM009 - Bioimaging (coordinator)

I am a tutor for Natural Sciences and Biosciences undergraduate students.

Modules

2023/24

• BIO2099 - Molecular Plant Science

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Supervision / Group

Postdoctoral researchers

Postgraduate researchers

Alumni

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