Skip to main content
Go to the home page of the European Commission (opens in new window)
English English
CORDIS - EU research results
CORDIS

Environment-coupled metabolic models for engineering high-temperature and drought REsistant LEAF metabolism.

Objective

Food security is one of the biggest challenges of our century. Climate change and an increasing human population call for
crop plants that are resistant to abiotic stresses, such as heat and drought while maintaining high productivity and nutritional
values. This will require rational strategies for metabolic engineering of crop plants. Fundamental to this engineering
challenge is the modelling of leaf metabolism. Leaves are the main site of photosynthesis and therefore the interface where
carbon from the environment is assimilated to synthesise and maintain cellular components. Plants have developed different
mechanisms to fix carbon: C3, C4, and Crassulacean Acid Metabolism (CAM). While C3 photosynthesis is the most
widespread form, the latter two exhibit higher efficiency at higher temperatures or drought, respectively. Current large-scale
metabolic models lack a mathematical description of processes on the interface between the environment and the leaf. To
address this problem, I intend to devise a computational approach that couples genome-scale metabolic modeling to the
environment by explicitly modeling gas-water exchange. These multi-layer models will help address fundamental questions
about the operation of C4 photosynthesis and CAM. The workplan comprises two research objectives: 1) Coupling CO2-
water gas exchange models with multi-timestep diel models: The CO2-water exchange models will allow changing
environmental conditions during the diel cycle (e.g. temperature and humidity cycles) to be coupled to the behavior of the
metabolic models. These environment-coupled models will be used to address the second research objective: 2) Model-driven studies of C4 and CAM metabolism: The extended diel models will be used to investigate metabolic engineering
strategies for improved productivity under high temperatures (e.g. by introducing C4) and to understand the trade-off
between productivity and water-use efficiency in both C3 and CAM plants.

Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)

CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/euroscivoc.

You need to log in or register to use this function

Keywords

Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)

Programme(s)

Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.

Topic(s)

Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.

Funding Scheme

Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.

MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF)

See all projects funded under this funding scheme

Call for proposal

Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.

(opens in new window) H2020-MSCA-IF-2017

See all projects funded under this call

Coordinator

THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD
Net EU contribution

Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.

€ 183 454,80
Address
WELLINGTON SQUARE UNIVERSITY OFFICES
OX1 2JD Oxford
United Kingdom

See on map

Region
South East (England) Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire Oxfordshire
Activity type
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
Links
Total cost

The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.

€ 183 454,80
My booklet 0 0