This $804,525 project grant from the National Science Foundation's Division of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences, under the Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074), will fund research exploring the epigenetic mechanisms by which ultraviolet B radiation alters DNA methylation patterns in plants. Specifically, the University of Missouri-St. Louis will investigate how UVB exposure and its photoreceptor interact to change locus- and tissue-specific DNA methylation in Arabidopsis thaliana, and how this induces stress priming and epigenetic memory. The grant also supports multidisciplinary training for students and scientists from underrepresented groups, and science education modules to disseminate epigenetics research to K-12 students and rural educators. Findings from this mechanistic study of how plants sense and respond to environmental stressors through chromatin remodeling could enable new crop varieties with improved resilience to climate change. The research is co-funded by NSF clusters focusing on genetic mechanisms and plant genomics, and aligns with the Foundation's mission to advance science and broader impacts criteria.
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