Department of Botany and Plant Pathology

Molecular mechanisms of bacterial pathogenesis and plant disease resistance

Inter-kingdom chemical signaling between bacteria and plants; Pseudomonas syringae; Arabidopsis; Signal transduction; Metabolomics

• My laboratory is working to understand the complex signaling events that occur between pathogenic bacteria and plants during infection. A major goal of our research is to understand how bacteria use plant-derived metabolites as chemical cues to deploy virulence factors such as the type III secretion system at the onset of infection. We are also investigating plant signaling pathways that are rapidly activated upon pathogen detection, with the goal of identifying elements of the plant immune response that provide effective resistance against bacterial pathogens. Our work focuses primarily on the model Pseudomonas syringae-Arabidopsis pathosystem, and we use a combination of genetic, biochemical, metabolomics and proteomics techniques to investigate signaling pathways in both pathogen and host.

Research Group Members 

PhD Candidates

• Megan O’Malley

• Conner Rogan

Faculty Research Assistant

• Yin-Yuin Pang

Undergraduate Researchers

• Daniel Bacher
• Sophie Mathews