News

A comprehensive analysis of the transcription factors (TF) that play in the vascular cambium has boosted our understanding of the underlying transcriptional regulation in this important plant meristem through the discovery of 32 cambium TFs.The work provides a significant new resource of genetic tools and data to advance further research in radial …

Plant scientists gather in Cambridge to advance collaborations in global food security research.They included scientists from the University of Cambridge’s Sainsbury Laboratory (SLCU) and Department of Plant Sciences, Lancaster University, The Sainsbury Laboratory (TSL) in Norwich and the John Innes Centre. With funding from Gatsby Charitable Found…

Seeds, Bees and Pollen was the theme at this year's hands-on exhibition run jointly by the Sainsbury Laboratory Cambridge University (SLCU) and Cambridge University Botanic Garden (CUBG) at Big Biology Day. People from all ages explored the many special mechanisms that plants have evolved to attract different pollinators and disperse their seeds th…

A vision of creating crops that do not need chemical fertilisers is one step closer thanks to the recent discovery that a substantial overlap exists in the developmental programmes plants use for lateral roots and nitrogen-fixing nodules. The ultimate goal of the scientists is to transfer nitrogen fixation into cereals. This aim will benefit those …

Once dismissed as ‘junk DNA’ that served no purpose, a family of ‘jumping genes’ found in tomatoes has the potential to accelerate crop breeding for traits such as improved drought resistance. Researchers from the University of Cambridge’s Sainsbury Laboratory (SLCU) and Department of Plant Sciences have discovered that drought stress triggers the …

A new, free online course aimed at 16-19 year olds across Europe, funded by EIT Food and developed by the Gatsby Plant Science Education Programme (GPSEP) at the University of Cambridge alongside international partners, aims to inspire young people to study science so they can help to create food of the future.We know the world’s population is grow…

New research from James Locke's group shows that clocks in plant seedlings can self-organise without a master. From cyanobacteria to humans, nearly all living things on Earth have an internal circadian clock that regulates their activities on a 24-hour cycle. For mammals, there is a master clock located in the brain that controls peripheral clocks …

An interdisciplinary research collaboration between SLCU and the University of Oxford has engineered a novel synthetic plant-microbe signalling pathway that could provide the foundation for transferring nitrogen fixation to cereals.Published in Nature Communications today, the team of plant scientists, microbiologists and chemists used synthetic bi…

The University of Cambridge has elected Giles Oldroyd to the Russel R Geiger Professorship of Crop Science, leading the Cambridge Centre for Crop Science (3CS), which is a partnership between the University of Cambridge and NIAB.As Director of 3CS Professor Oldroyd will be based in the Crop Science Building at NIAB’s new headquarters on Lawrence We…

Scientists at Sainsbury Laboratory have uncovered striking similarities in how two distantly related plants defend against pathogens despite splitting from their common ancestor more than 400 million years ago. Our current understanding on how plants successfully defend against disease-causing pathogens mainly originates from studying economically …

Dr Sarah Robinson has joined the SLCU research leadership team and will head a new research group focused on investigating the mechanical properties of plants associated with growth.Dr Robinson, who has been appointed as a Career Development Fellow, brings with her an interdisciplinary approach incorporating biomechanics, modelling and genomics to …

Plant scientists at SLCU and the University of Bordeaux have discovered a gene that they hope can be used to widen a nutrient trafficking bottleneck and potentially increase crop yields.Plant scientists around the world are working on a number of different strategies to sustainably increase crop yields. Increasing the efficiency of how plants trans…

The Schornack team has discovered that increasing the activity of a single gene can increase a plant’s resistance to blight at its first line of defence — the epidermis.In the 1840s, a mysterious single-celled organism devastated Ireland's potato crops, contributing to a catastrophe, the 'Great Hunger', in which millions of people died or were forc…

SLCU is delighted to welcome Dr François Nédélec to the join its research leadership team.Dr Nédélec brings with him a wealth of knowledge and experience in cell and developmental biology with a multidisciplinary background in mathematics, physics and biology combining theoretical and experimental investigations to exploring cell biology dynamics.H…

New insights into how buds communicate with each other through the dynamic auxin transport network have been published by SLCU plant scientists. Most gardeners know that to encourage a bushy plant they need to prune off the top leading shoot. Decapitating the plant by removing the dominant apical shoot apex helps the many dormant lateral (axillary)…