For further details see:
University of Essex webpage |
Alexandra Milliken
PhD project: Improving Yield Potential By Exploiting Natural Variation in Pea Exploring the natural variation in the current pea germplasm provides a non-Gm way to identify lines with heightened photosynthetic capacity, yield potential and abiotic stress resistance to enable food demands to be met under future climatic conditions. All of which need to be considered, as pea yields are currently stagnating due to poor soil quality. Pea populations will be screened within this study to enable lines with greater photosynthetic potential and fast/connected stomatal responses to be fed forward into future breeding programmes. The majority of studies investigating photosynthetic capacity and yield contributions only measure foliar tissues, with little investigation of the potential of non-foliar tissues to contribute to carbohydrate acquisition. This study will utilise Lawson lab bespoke non-foliar chambers to enable the exploration of the photosynthetic capacity of non-leaf pea tissues (including pods) and whether their contributions to yield increases when leaf photosynthesis is compromised. The influence of blue light photoreceptors and their underlying signally pathways on photosynthesis and stomatal processes will also be studied, utilising the newly available pea blue light photoreceptor mutants. Research interests:
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