School of Molecular Biosciences

Research interests

Life has evolved on a rotating Earth, subject to alternating periods of light and darkness. As a result, most (perhaps all) organisms possess circadian clocks (from the Latin circa diem, about a day) that allow them to anticipate environmental changes, not just respond to them; they exhibit circadian rhythms. Living cells can actually "tell the time", and use this information to control their behaviour; they have a central clock that sends signals along "output pathways" to coordinate their physiology. Humans experience the circadian clock in the form of jetlag or problems associated with shiftwork. The phase of the clock can be advanced or delayed by signals called "zeitgebers", such as light and temperature. Hence there is a lot of interest in developing light regimes or other treatments that will allow airline passengers to adapt more rapidly to changes in time zone. In plants the circadian clock contributes to optimal growth and often controls flowering time - important for crop yield and the horticulture industry (e.g. for getting chrysanthemums into flower shortly before Mother's Day). Thus developing a better understanding of the molecular mechanism of the circadian clock is of great importance both in human biology and for agriculture. 

My interest in the plant circadian clock started in a project on the control of CO₂ fixation in Crassulacean acid metabolism plants. In the mid 2000s we found that the detailed mechanism of the circadian clock in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana is organ-specific and that the root clock is coordinated by a signal from the shoots. We now know that the organ specificity results from different light inputs to the shoots and roots (Wiley) and we are investigating the nature of the timing signal between shoots and roots.

‌‌We also found that the Arabidopsis circadian clock responds to temperature changes through alternative splicing of several clock genes (Plant Cell) and this has developed into a collaborative project with John Brown (Dundee) on the role of alternative splicing in controlilng the cold transcriptome in Arabidopsis. This work is now funded by grants from BBSRC and the Leverhulme Trust.