8:45 AM - 9:25 AM

<aside> <img src="/icons/map-pin_green.svg" alt="/icons/map-pin_green.svg" width="40px" /> DPB Seminar Room + Zoom (DGE Conference Room, Solarium, DGE Lobby, Library)

</aside>

<aside> <img src="/icons/megaphone_green.svg" alt="/icons/megaphone_green.svg" width="40px" /> Chair by: Liat Adler

</aside>

<aside> <img src="/icons/music-artist_green.svg" alt="/icons/music-artist_green.svg" width="40px" /> On the importance of noise in cell polarity - a GEF protein domain that modulates cell shape in polar growing plant cells

Guido Grossmann - Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf

8:45 AM - 8:58 AM

“Between attraction and defense - How roots pattern their associated microbiota."

</aside>

<aside> <img src="/icons/music-artist_green.svg" alt="/icons/music-artist_green.svg" width="40px" /> Cortical Microtubule Array Patterning in Hypocotyl Cells

Sid Shaw - Indiana University

8:58 AM - 9:11 AM

Cortical microtubules in flowering plants act as patterning agents for cellulose deposition, serving as platforms for cellulose synthase insertion into the plasma membrane and as guides for synthase movement. Imaging studies and genetic analysis in Arabidopsis hypocotyl cells initiated at the Carnegie Institution have provided tremendous insights into mechanisms controlling cortical array pattern specification and maintenance. Recent work points to a primary role for microtubule nucleation in specifying the underlying architecture of this dynamic polymer system. New work investigating the molecular factors involved in distributing plant microtubule nucleation complexes provides evidence for a remarkable level of cellular control governing microtubule patterning.

</aside>

<aside> <img src="/icons/music-artist_green.svg" alt="/icons/music-artist_green.svg" width="40px" /> CarboProbes - Illuminating spatial cell wall organization in living plants.

Renee Weizbauer - Carnegie Science

9:11 AM - 9:25 AM

The development of genetically encoded fusion proteins with fluorescent markers has revolutionized our ability to visualize and measure dynamic protein organization within living cells. Complex carbohydrates, mainly assembled by fleets of enzymes in the Golgi apparatus, require a different approach. Motivated by the question of how dynamic, carbohydrate-rich walls surrounding each plant cell are being built and modified, I am developing tools for in vivo imaging of carbohydrates, based on expressible, fluorescently labeled antibody fragments specific to different carbohydrate signatures e.g in xyloglucan, xylan and homogalacturonan. There are two different setups: “CarboProbes” are antibody fragments fused with an apoplastic signal sequence and a fluorophore to target specific carbohydrate motifs. “CarboSensors” are reporters that can change fluorescent output upon binding to their specific carbohydrate targets in living plants. I developed a proof-of concept CarboSensor for xyloglucan. CarboSensor-based fluorescence is visible in both endomembrane compartments and cell periphery, possibly allowing tracking of secretion events of xyloglucan at the cell membrane. This might allow us to follow wall formation as it happens. I will present my current progress developing functional CarboSensors and outline possibilities on the level of tool development and addressing biological questions that may now be possible to probe.

</aside>