We invite you to a "double" seminar by two scientists who have recently been awarded our newly established intra-institutional research grants. They will present their projects supported by these grants.

• Tetiana Kalachova, Laboratory of Pathological Plant Physiology:

Dwarf tales – how salicylic acid mediates plant growth inhibition

and

• Eva Dvořák Tomaštíková, Centre of Plant Structural and Functional Genomics:

Into the haze of DNA-protein crosslink repair

In response to genotoxic stress, cells activate a variety of pathways to maintain genome stability and replication progression. Particularly, replication and repair of repetitive sequences (e.g. rDNA) require tightly regulated homologous recombination (HR).

In Arabidopsis, tandem repetitive rDNA arrays are one of the most complicated regions for replication progress and repair. Our data suggest that covalent DNA-protein complexes (DPCs) with METHYLTRANSFERASE 1 accumulate at these repetitive rDNA arrays after zebularine treatment. We already showed that the repair of such DPCs requires HR factors, and the SMC5/6 complex. Recently, we identified SUMO-TARGETED UBIQUITIN LIGASE 2 (STUbL2) in our forward-directed screen for factors involved in DPC repair.

This finding led us to propose a hypothesis suggesting that the NSE2 subunit of SMC5/6 SUMOylates DPC sites that are then recognized by STUbL2. Using genetic, proteomic and microscopic techniques, we will test this idea and further determine whether STUbL2 mediates the relocalization of DPCs to the nuclear periphery where they are repaired.

The seminar will be held at the Institute of Experimental Botany, Czech Academy of Sciences, Rozvojová 263, Prague 6, in the Library room (building B1, 1st floor).

Time schedule:
13:00–13:30 presentation by Tetiana Kalachova
13:30–13:45 break
13:45–14:15 presentation by Eva Dvořák Tomaštíková