The Groups > Professor Steve Tyerman
 

Professor Steve Tyerman
Wine Industry Professor of Viticulture
Discipline Head of Wine & Horticulture
Associate Editor of Journal of Experimental Botany
Monitoring Editor of Plant Physiology
The University of Adelaide,
Discipline of Wine and Horticulture,
Waite Campus,
Private Mail Bag 1,
Glen Osmond SA 5064

Personal Website Address: http://www.agwine.adelaide.edu.au/people/wine/styerm01.html
Email: steve.tyerman@adelaide.edu.au

Research Aims
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The Big Question

  • What are aquaporins and non-selective channels really doing in plants?

The Short-term goals

  • Determine selectivity of key aquaporins and non-selective channels in biotrophic interfaces.
  • Determine the roles of aquaporins in grapevines.
  • Determine new efficient ways of measuring plant water status in the field.
  • Understand the hydraulic architecture of grapevines.
  • Determine the function of non-selective cation and anion channels in roots and seeds.
Group (lab) Members and areas of research
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  • Dr Christa Niemietz: Research Associate, Aquaporin functional characterisation.
  • Dr Wen-Hao Zhang: Research Associate, Ion channels, patch clamping and electrophysioloy.
  • Wendy Sullivan: Research Assistant, Membrane isolation, RNA preparation, plant culture.
  • Rebecca Coleman: PhD Student, hydraulics of grapevine roots and aquaporins.
  • Joe Tilbrook: PhD Student, hydraulics of grape berries during development, Shiraz berry weight loss.
  • Megan Sheldon: PhD Student, hydraulics of stem and petiole of grapevines, cavitation and role of aquaporins.
  • Helen Bramley: PhD Student, Water logging effects in wheat and lupins, role of aquaporins and root structure.
  • Alex Tucker: PhD Student (Located CSIRO), Effects of high carbon dioxide on response of grapevines to water stress.
  • Matthew Heyes: PhD Student (Located CSIRO), Influence on plant gene expression by grapevine powdery mildew.
  • Seth de Bolt: PhD Student, organic acid metabolism and transport in pre-veraison grape berries.
  • Thomas Phillips: Honours Student, Molybdenum translocation in grapevines and assays for molybdenum deficiency.
Funding
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Current:

  • $252,000 project funding (CRCV/GWRDC and ARC, with many other investigators)

Applications submitted or planned:

  • CRC for Wine bid for University of Adelaide with others (CSIRO, GWRDC, Charles Sturt University ).  
Techniques in the Laboratory
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Currently active:

Plant membrane patch clamping, vesicle transport using stopped flow spectrofluorimetery, Microelectrode Ion Flux Estimation (MIFE TM ), transport gene expression in Xenopus oocytes, pressure probe (root and cell) techniques, hydraulic conductance flow meter,

In development

acoustic emissions in cavitation, small scale water flux estimations

Main areas of expertise
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Top three areas of knowledge

  1. ion channels,
  2. aquaporins,
  3. plant water relations

Top three technical skills

  • patch clamping,
  • electrophysiology,
  • pressure probe techniques
A statement on most significant contributions to this research field
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Dr Tyerman has led research groups working on membrane transport in plants. He has discovered with collaborators several new membrane transport systems and has identified how cation and anion channels might function in salinity stress, aluminium tolerance, exchange of nutrients with symbiotic nitrogen-fixing bacteria and seed loading in grain legumes. Tyerman's group with Prof Day's group were the first to apply the patch clamp technique to a symbiotic membrane interface where they discovered a novel ion channel that could deliver fixed nitrogen to plants (Tyerman, Whitehead and Day, 1995). The collaboration with Professor Day and his group lead to papers in Nature, Science and the Plant Journal . Dr Tyerman's group discovered an ion channel in wheat roots that enables the uptake of sodium, and this instigated several international laboratories to search for similar channels and their genes in plants (Tyerman et al 1997). Dr Tyerman's group with Dr Ryan also identified an anion channel in wheat root tips that releases organic acid to complex toxic aluminium in the soil (Ryan et al. 1997). This has lead to an international effort to find the gene for the transporter. Water relations of plants has always been prominent in Dr Tyerman's research since he established the cell pressure probe technique in Australia . Simultaneously with Maurel's group in France , Tyerman's group applied sophisticated stopped flow spectrofluorimetry techniques to assay aquaporin activity in plant membrane vesicles (Niemietz and Tyerman, 1997). Using this technique his group was the first to demonstrate that ammonia gas may permeate membranes via a channel pathway (Niemietz and Tyerman, 2000) and recently a new class of aquaporin inhibitors was discovered (Niemietz and Tyerman, 2002). With JW Patrick and NA Walker, he discovered channels, including novel non-selective channels, responsible for release of phloem-imported ions from seed coats (Zhang et al . 2002 and earlier publications). To investigate non-selective ion channels and other transporters Dr Tyerman and collaborators were the first to combine patch clamp with a non-destructive method to measure net ion fluxes across a single cell or single patch (Tyerman et al., 2002). Dr Tyerman's contributions are unique in their characteristic of applying new technologies to answer physiological problems and in having links to the physiology of whole plants.

Other evidence of impact and contributions to the field Tyerman
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  • Obtained Chair of Viticulture at The University of Adelaide partly based on contributions to the field.
  • Strong record in Research Higher Degree completions (6) and currently supervising 7 PhD students.
  • Hosting a total of 15 sabbatical research visits by overseas colleagues in our laboratory in recent years to undertake collaborative studies on membrane channels and transporters.
  • Elected as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science in 2003
Prizes
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I obtained the Goldacre Medal for research in Plant Physiology from the Australian Society of Plant Physiologists in 1989.

Editorial responsibilities

  • Monitoring Editor for Plant Physiology (1999 to present.)

  • Associate Editor for Journal of Experimental Botany (1999 to present)

  • Member of the Editorial Advisory Board for The Plant Journal to present.

  • Review papers for: Science, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, The Plant Cell, Planta, Plant Cell and Environment, Journal of Membrane Biology and several others.

International Conferences in last 5 years
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  • Gordon Conference on Cellular Basis of Adaptation to Salt and Water Stress in Plants August 1998 Oxford (40 min talk as a principal speaker)

  • 11 th International Workshop on Plant Membrane Biology August 1998 Cambridge (Chair of Molecular Mechanisms and Regulation of Channels, Organiser and speaker in Technical Workshop on Biophysics and molecular biology of plant aquaporins.)

  • MIP 2000 conference in Gotenborg Sweden . (30 min talk)

In addition I was a member of the international organising committee for the 10 th (1995) 11 th (1998) and 12 th (2001) International Workshop on Plant Membrane Transport. I was on the organising committee for the Gordon Conference on Cellular Basis of Adaptation to Salt and Water Stress in Plants held in Tilton in 2000.

Publications - Last 5 years
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Journal Articles

  • Zhang, W-H., Walker , N.A., Patrick, J.W., Tyerman , S.D . (2004) Pulsed Cl - currents in coat cells of developing bean seeds are stimulated by hyposomotic shock. Journal of Experimental Botany (in press)

  • Zhang, W-H., Walker, N.A., Patrick, J.W., Tyerman, S.D . (2004) Calcium-dependent K + permeable current in plasma membranes of dermal cells of developing bean cotyledons. Plant Cell and Environment 27:251-262.

  • Bramley H., Tyerman , S.D. and Hutson J. (2003) Floodwater infiltration through root channels on a sodic clay floodplain and the influence on a local tree species Eucalyptus largiflorens . Plant and Soil 253:275-286.

  • Loveys B.R., Tyerman S.D. and Loveys B.R. (2002) Effect of different host plants on the growth of the root hemiparasite Santalum acuminatum (quandong). Aust. J. Exp. Agriculture 42:97-102.

  • Tyerman , S.D. Niemietz, C.M. and Bramley H (2002) Plant aquaporins: multifunctional water and solute channels with expanding roles. Plant Cell and Environment 125:173-194.

  • Zhang, W-H., Skerrett, M., Walker, N.A., Patrick, J.W. and Tyerman, S.D. (2002) Non-selective currents and channels in plasma membranes of protoplasts from coats of developing seeds of Phaseolus vulgaris L. Plant Physiology 128:388-399.

  • Roberts DM, Tyerman SD (2002) Voltage-dependent cation channels permeable to NH 4 + , K + and Ca 2+ in the symbiosome membrane of the model legume Lotus japonicus . Plant Physiology: 128: 370-378.

  • Tyerman SD (2002) Nonselective cation channels. Multiple functions and commonalities. Plant Physiol. 128:327-328. (plus cover)

  • Niemietz, C.M. and Tyerman S.D. (2002) New potent inhibitors of aquaporins: Silver and gold compounds inhibit aquaporins of plant and human origin. FEBS Letters, 531 (3): 443-447.

  • Loveys, B.R., Tyerman , S.D. and Loveys, B.R. (2001) The transfer of photosynthate and naturally occurring insecticidal compounds from host plants to the root hemiparasite Santalum acuminatum . Aust. J. Bot. 49: 9-16

  • Zhang, W-H., Ryan, P.R. and Tyerman, S.D. (2001) Malate-permeable channels and cation channels activated by aluminium in the apical cells of wheat roots. Plant Physiology 125: 1459-1472.

  • Day, D.A., Poole, P. S., Tyerman , S.D. and Rosendahl, L. (2001) Ammonia and amino acid transport across symbiotic membranes in nitrogen-fixing legume nodules. Cellular and Molecular Life Science 58: 61-71.

  • Loveys, B.R., Loveys, B.R. and Tyerman , S.D. (2001) An ecophysiological study of the root hemi-parasite Santalum acuminatum (R.Br.) A. DC (quandong). Aust. J. Bot. 49:479-486.

  • Patrick J., Zhang, W-H., Tyerman , S.D. Offler, C., and Walker , A. (2001) Membrane transport in movement of assimilates. Aust. J. Plant Physiol. 28:695-707.

  • Whitehead, L.F., Tyerman , S.D. and Day, D.A. (2001) Polyamines as potential regulators of nutrient exchange across the peribacteroid membrane in soybean root nodules. Aust. J. Plant Physiol. 28: 675-681.

  • Tyerman , S.D. , Bielby, M., Whittington, J., Juswono, U., Newman, I. and Shabala, S. (2001). Oscillations in proton transport revealed from simultaneous measurements of net current and net proton fluxes from isolated root protoplasts: MIFE meets patch-clamp . Aust. J. Plant Physiol. 28: 591-604.

  • Zhang W.H., Walker, N.A., Tyerman , S.D. and Patrick, J.W. (2000) Fast activation of time-dependent outward current in plasma membrane of ground parenchyma cells derived from coats of developing Phaseolus vulgaris seeds. Planta 211:894-898.

  • Niemietz, C.M. and Tyerman S.D. (2000) Channel-mediated permeation of ammonia gas through the peribacteroid membrane of soybean nodules. FEBS Letters 465:110-114.

  • Zubrinich, T.M., Loveys, B., Gallasch, S., Seekamp, J.V. and Tyerman, S.D. (2000) Tolerance of salinised floodplain conditions in a naturally occurring Eucalyptus hybrid related to lowered plant water potential. Tree Physiology 20:953-963.

  • Tyerman , S.D. and Skerrett, I.M. (1999). Root ion channels and salinity. Scientia Horticulturae 78:175-235.

  • Tyerman , S.D. Bohnert, H.J., Maurel, C., Steudle, E., Smith, J.A.C. (1999) Plant aquaporins: their molecular biology, biophysics and significance for plant water relations. J. Exp. Bot. 50:1055-1071.

  • Zhang, W-H. Tyerman , S.D. (1999) Inhibition by HgCl 2 of water channels in intact wheat root cells. Plant Physiology 120:849-857.

  • Slavich, P.G., Smith, K.S., Tyerman , S.D. and Walker , G.R. (1999) Water use of grazed salt bush plantations with saline watertable. Agricultural Water Management 39:169-185.
Ten Career Best publications
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  • Tyerman , S.D. , Hatcher, A.I., West, R.J. and Larkum, A.W.D. (1984). Posidonia australis growing in altered salinities: Leaf growth, regulation of turgor and the development of osmotic gradients. Aust. J. Plant Physiol. 11:35-47.

  • Tyerman , S.D. , Terry, B.R., Findlay , G.P. (1992). Multiple conductances in the large K channel from Chara corallina shown by a transient analysis method. Biophys. J. 61:736-749.

  • Tyerman , S.D. (1992). Anion channels in plants. Ann. Rev. Plant Physiol. and Plant Mol. Biol . 43, 351-73.

  • Tyerman , S.D . , Whitehead, L.F., and Day, D.A. (1995). A channel-like transporter for NH 4 + on the symbiotic interface of N 2 -fixing plants. Nature 378:629-632.

  • Tyerman , S.D . , Skerrett, M Garrill, A., Findlay , G.P. and Leigh, R.A. (1997). Pathways for the permeation of Na + and Cl - into protoplasts derived from wheat roots. J.Exp. Bot. 48:459-480.

  • Ryan, P.R., Skerrett, M., Findlay , G.P., Delhaize, E. and Tyerman , S.D. (1997). Aluminum activates an anion channel in the apical cells of wheat roots. PNAS ( USA ) 94:6547-6552.

  • Niemietz, C.N. and Tyerman , S.D. (1997). Characterization of water channels in wheat root membrane vesicles. Plant Physiology . 115:561-567.

  • Kaiser, B.N., Finnegan, P.M., Tyerman , S.D. , Whitehead, L.F., Bergerson, F.J., Day, D.A., Udvardi, M.K. (1998) Characterization of an ammonium transport protein from the peribacteroid membrane of soybean nodules. Science 281:1202-1205 .

  • Niemietz, C.M. and Tyerman S.D. (2000) Channel-mediated permeation of ammonia gas through the peribacteroid membrane of soybean nodules. FEBS Letters 465:110-114.

  • Niemietz, C.M. and Tyerman S.D. (2002) New potent inhibitors of aquaporins: Silver and gold compounds inhibit aquaporins of plant and human origin. FEBS Letters , 531 (3): 443-447.

 

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