Your Best Face Forward - How cereals regulate their epidermal surfaces

To avoid desiccation in terrestrial habitats, land plants evolved protective barriers including an external, waxy layer or cuticle preventing dessication as well as specialised epidermal surface cells such as stomata which allow exchange of gases needed for growth and development. Grasses, including our staple cereals, show thick cuticles and special stomata to help them survive challenging dry environments, as well as other specialised epidermal cells such as prickle hairs. While all these epidermal traits are important for plant growth and survival, we understand little about these different features are coordinated or their individual and collective contributions to plant performance, especially under different climates. This PhD will use barley, a major global cereal, as a model to define the genes and processes important for epidermal development. This work will use cutting edge genetic techniques as well as exploitation and generation of genetic resources to identify and characterise the function of genes controlling the cuticle, stomata, prickle hairs and other epidermal features. This work will also learn how these genes may interact to control these traits and their role in response to drought. Taken together, this research will advance our understanding of genes and networks controlling epidermal features important for crop sustainability.