DynaMo Seminar: Georg Jander

DynaMo Semiars are a series of public seminars hosted by DNRF Center DynaMo. We are honored to be able to host this seminar with

Georg Jander

Cornell University, Ithaca, New York

A genetic and biochemical basis for natural variation in maize aphid resistance

Cultivated maize lines show considerable variation in their resistance to insect herbivores. Genetic mapping linked maize aphid resistance with differences in the profile of leaf benzoxazinoids, a class of defensive metabolites that is found in many grasses. Analysis of an inactivating transposon insertion in a maize benzoxazinoid methyltransferase gene confirmed that this specific enzyme causes aphid sensitivity. This is in marked contrast to previous experiments showing increased caterpillar resistance through methylation of benzoxazinoids by the same enzyme. Thus, there are ecological tradeoffs in benzoxazinoid production, with the methylated form of the benzoxazinoids providing caterpillar resistance and the non-methylated form providing aphid resistance. The identification of specific genes that influence this defensive tradeoff will facilitate future breeding efforts to produce maize with enhanced or more targeted resistance to insect herbivores.

Georg Jander is Associate Professor at the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York.  His lab uses genetic and biochemical approaches to study plant-insect interactions and plant amino acid metabolism, mostly using Arabidopsis and maize. Georg Janer obtained his PhD in Microbiology and Molecular Genetics from Harvard University in 1995. After postdoctotal appointments at Massachusetts General Hospital and Cereon Genomics, Cambridge, MA, he came to the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research in 2002 and has been there since then.