News from the John Innes Centre

Two scientists from the John Innes Centre have been elected as Fellows of the Royal Society, the premier scientific accolade in the UK. Their breakthroughs in fundamental research have pioneered advances in antibiotic discovery and in crop improvement from which we all benefit. Professor Mike Bevan pioneered methods for expressing foreign genes in plants that [...]

For the first time in nearly a century drinkers will be able to taste beer made from Chevallier, the classic heritage barley from the Victorian period. Old varieties are a rich source of new genes, and scientists at the John Innes Centre revived Chevallier from the institute’s Genetic Resources Unit as part of a barley [...]

Leaves come in all shapes and sizes. Scientists have discovered simple rules that control leaf shape during growth. Using this ‘recipe’, they have developed the first computer model able to accurately emulate leaf growth from a bud.  “A bud does not grow in all directions at the same rate,” said Samantha Fox from the John [...]

  The way in which plants space out the pores through which they breathe depends on keeping a protein active during stem cell growth, according to John Innes Centre scientists. Plant pores, called stomata, are essential for life. When they evolved about 400 million years ago, they helped plants conquer the land. Plants absorb carbon [...]

New research from the John Innes Centre on how plants adapt their flowering to climate is also helping to unravel some of the mysteries of how genes are controlled. Until relatively recently genome sequencing projects, and studies of gene expression have mostly focussed on the messenger RNA transcripts produced from genes that contain the code [...]

The journal Science recently produced a Special Issue on Plant-Microbe Interactions, and the John Innes Centre and Sainsbury Laboratory’s expertise in this area was recognised with three of the seven articles being authored by current scientists.  Anne Osbourn surveyed the latest understanding in the chemical diversity in plant defence compounds.  Plants produce a wide array [...]

A scientific team from the John Innes Centre and University of St Andrews has identified a key gene that was transferred from a Sicilian plant into a close relative in Britain, showing how genetic cross-talk between species can be important for evolution. The researchers unravelled the remarkable history of an Italian interloper, a close relative [...]

Scientists at the John Innes Centre in Norwich have discovered how roots find their way past obstacles to grow through soil. The discovery, described in the journal Science, also explains how germinating seedlings penetrate the soil without pushing themselves out as they burrow. “The key is in the fuzzy coat of hairs on the roots [...]