Date of Award:

5-1-2005

Document Type:

Thesis

Degree Name:

Master of Science (MS)

Department:

Biology

Department name when degree awarded

Life Sciences: Biology

Committee Chair(s)

Daryll B. DeWald

Committee

Daryll B. DeWald

Committee

Bruce Bugbee

Committee

Jon Y. Takemoto

Abstract

The oxygen level at or below which respiration is limited is termed hypoxia. Hypoxia can be induced by several different environmental factors, including flooding and microgravity. Plants have developed mechanisms to survive and acclimate to these conditions through changes in morphology, metabolic pathways, and protein synthesis. One mechanism used by plants to signal stress environments is a signal transduction pathway involving membrane phospholipids that can induce calcium mobilization, or the movement of calcium into the cytosol from extracellular or in-tracellular stores. However, the data from this study indicates that hypoxic stress did not result in phosphoinositide accumulation or calcium mobilization in Arabidopsis thaliana. Understanding plant responses to hypoxia may allow the development of transgenic plants that can thrive in field and spaceflight-induced hypoxic environments.

Included in

Biology Commons

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