Research

Dr. Chandlee’s research interests center on obtaining a basic understanding of fundamental molecular genetic mechanisms that act to control plant developmental processes through the regulation of gene activity. In addition, the laboratory is interested in developing efficient methods for gene transfer in plants for the purpose of trait modification and enhancement for a variety of plant species.

Senescence is an important developmental process in plants that eventually leads to whole plant, organ, tissue and cell death through endogenously controlled degenerative processes. The laboratory has used soybean cotyledon and whole plant senescence as a model system to identify genes and gene products regulated in expression during this developmental process. Understanding senescence at the molecular level should provide fundamental information about cell differentiation and the regulation of cellular events through the action of plant hormones and other signals. This work will begin the process of defining the various signaling pathways of induction and subsequent progress of the pathways and their branch points within the overall senescence program.

Efficient transformation methods have been developed for introducing genetic material into plant cells with the most success demonstrated with either microprojectile bombardment (biolistics) or Agrobacterium-based methods. In the past my laboratory has been working to develop protocols using both methods for introducing various gene constructs into a variety of species. This work is performed in collaboration with Dr. Albert Kausch, also of CMB.