Membrane Transport and Signalling in Marine Protists- A Key Step in Understanding Environmental Physiology
Presentation
Overview
Overview
Description
Despite their pivotal role in determining marine productivity and global elemental cycles, very little is known about the transport and cellular signalling processes that underlie nutrient acquisition and environmental sensing in marine phytoplankton. Using a combination of electrophysiology and high resolution imaging approaches we are investigating membrane transport processes in three major groups of phytoplankton; diatoms, coccolithophores and dinoflagellates. Our results are providing intriguing physiological and evolutionary insights into these widespread and successful organisms. Of particular significance is the discovery of a fast animal-like action potential exhibited by the diatom Odontella sinensis (Taylor, 2009), supporting the contention that this rapid signalling mechanism arose in ancestral unicellular eukaryotes and has been retained in phylogenetically distant lineages. Our recent work aimed to provide a detailed characterisation of key phytoplankton membrane transport and signalling processes will be discussed.
Taylor, A.R. (2009) A Fast Na+/Ca2+-Based Action Potential in a Marine Diatom. PLoS ONE 4(3): e4966. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0004966
