Date: 12th December 2018
Time: 13:15
Title: A structural journey with floral regulators
Location: Seminar room 2012, Biocentre 2, Viikinkaari 5
Host: Paula Elomaa
Abstract: In Arabidopsis like in many other plants, flowers are initiated on the flanks of the shoot apical meristem. The position of flowers is determined by the phytohormone auxin and the Auxin Response Factor Monopteros/ARF5 protein. Soon afterwards, the LEAFY transcription factor contributes to the emergence and the floral fate of the newly formed flower meristem. We used a combination of molecular genetics, structural biology, genomics and modelling to better understand how these transcription factors to access to specific genomic regions and control gene expression.
Francois Parcy studies how flower development is controlled at the transcriptional and chromatin levels. His lab focuses in particular on the LEAFY and ULTRAPETALA1 proteins and uses the development of flowers as a model process to address general questions such as the interplay between transcription factors (TF) and chromatin remodeling proteins, the modeling of sequence specific DNA recognition by TF or the evolution of regulatory networks.