The Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Plant Cell Walls
The Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Plant Cell Walls (CoE PCW) is an international research and training centre that will define the regulation of molecular, enzymic and cellular processes that control the synthesis, deposition, re-modelling and depolymerisation of wall polysaccharides of cereals and grasses.
Aim
To advance fundamental scientific understanding of plant cell wall biology to enable sustainable biomass production for food security, human health, and energy biomass conversion
Plant cell walls are the major renewable resource for transport fuels, act as functional foods to improve human health, and are a source of raw materials for industrial processes.
More specific aims of the Centre are to define:
- molecular mechanisms for the synthesis of individual cell wall components,
- how wall components are organized and the nature of molecular networks within walls, and
- remodelling of wall networks both during normal growth and under stress,
which will be achieved using a multidisciplinary research approach combining molecular and cellular biology, biochemistry, glycomics, metabolomics, protein chemistry and enzymology, plant transformation and bioinformatics.
This is a joint international program involving the research groups of Prof Tony Bacic (Deputy Director, University of Melbourne), Prof Geoff Fincher (Director, University of Adelaide), Dr Rachel Burton (University of Adelaide), Prof Mike Gidley (University of Queensland), with international collaborators; Prof V Bulone (KTH, Sweden), Prof C Halpin (University of Dundee, UK), Dr V Knauf, (Arcadia Biosicences Inc), Dr P Schweizer (Leibniz-Institute of Plant Genetics & Crop Plant Research, Germany), Prof R Waugh (Scottish Crop Research Institute, UK), Dr Scott Tingey, (DuPont Pioneer, USA) and Prof C Somerville (Energy Biosciences Institute, USA).
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