Degree- or Independent projects

Title: Host plant preference of malaria mosquitoes during the dry season in Burkina Faso.

Supervisor: Hillary Kirwa (hillary.kirwa@slu.se), Department of Plant Protection Biology, SLU

Co-supervisors: Rickard Ignell and Sharon R. Hill, Department of Plant Protection Biology

Brief description:

Mosquitoes frequently visit plants to obtain sugars as energy source. However, differences among plants in accessible sugars affect mosquito survival and reproduction. Recent studies have demonstrated that, while mosquitoes are selective in their choices of plants they feed on, infection with Plasmodium parasites, the causative agent of malaria, increases both the attraction of the vector to and sugar uptake from the preferred host plants. As a result, plant sugar source can be a significant driver of malaria transmission dynamics, with some plant species providing plant sugars with variable nutritional quality, and exhibiting either suppression or enhancement of malaria transmission. Consequently, understanding plant selection for feeding by malaria vectors is essential and offers promising opportunities for the suppression of vector competence and the development of novel control strategies against malaria. In this study, we will seek to identify the natural host plants for sugar sources of malaria vectors during dry season with the goal of determining the host plant range of Plasmodium-infected and non-infected malaria mosquitoes, using plant DNA barcoding.

What you will be doing:

You will be working on already collected mosquito samples from a malaria endemic region in western Burkina Faso. Using molecular techniques, you will extract and identify plant genomic DNA from the mosquito abdomen, following an established protocol, identify Plasmodium parasites from the head and thorax of collected mosquito samples.

Expertise to gain in this project:

The project will encompass molecular analyses techniques, and you will get to work in a well-equipped molecular laboratory, gaining skills in:

• Extraction of genomic DNA
• Use of conventional PCR and real time PCR
• Analysis of genomic DNA sequences

Time frame:

This will be a short-term (3 - 6) master’s thesis project. If this interests you, please contact me.

Title: Tracking fungicide resistance in the pathogen responsible for early blight disease in potato

 Supervisors: Chiara De Pasqual (chiara.de.pasqual@slu.se), Department of Plant Protection, SLU

Åsa Lankinen, Department of Plant Protection, SLU

Brief description: In agriculture, pathogens and disease spread are primarily controlled with fungicides. While these chemicals effectively control diseases, their widespread application poses environmental risks and select for pathogens that are increasingly resistant to their efficacy. Therefore, we need to constantly monitor their efficacy to avoid misuse.

What you will be doing:

You will be working with the fungus Alternaria solani, previously collected from potato fields, and a currently used fungicide. You will be performing assays that test whether different fungicide concentrations affect the ability of the fungus’ spores to germinate and continue to spread in the fields.

This project entails:

• Maintenance of fungal cultures
• Spore harvest, count and germination assay
• Microscope work

Time frame:

This project is suitable for an independent project (Bachelor thesis) with flexible time frame within spring and/or summer 2024.

Title: Drought and heat stress tolerance in Oats

Supervisor: Sajeevan Radha Sivarajan (sajeevan.radha.sivarajan@slu.se), Department of Plant Protection Biology, SLU

Brief description:

Drought and heat stress are the two most important abiotic stresses affecting crop yields worldwide. Conventionally, drought and heat stress are studied by applying the stresses and analyzing the responses individually.On the contrary, in nature, the situation is different. Crop plants are routinely exposed to simultaneous drought and heat stress, leading to a more severe yield loss than that of individual stresses. Oat (Avena sativa L.) is one of Sweden's major food and fodder crops. The response of oat plants to drought and heat stress, individually or in combination, has not been studied at the physiological, metabolic, or molecular level. Therefore, the specific focus of the projects will be to phenotype the oat population and decipher the physiological, metabolic, or molecular responses to individual and combinations of drought and heat stress at different stages of development.

Where you will work:

Greenhouse and Control growth chambers for stress imposition and phenotyping activities.

Well-equipped labs for metabolic and molecular work.

What you will become an expert:

The project will encompass various physiological, biochemical, and molecular analyses. Depending on the project duration, you can work on different below-mentioned activities

Stress physiology - gravimetric method of drought stress imposition

Physiological measurements - photosynthesis, chlorophyll fluorescence, etc.

Biochemical analyses - quantify the toxic and protective enzymes in tissues

Molecular analysis – global gene expression through RNA Seq analysis and real-time PCR

Metabolic analysis – identify various metabolites through metabolomics analysis

Time Frame:

We are flexible and can discuss the time frame.

I have multiple openings for master's thesis, both long (1 year) and short-term (3 - 6 months) projects. If this interests you, please contact me and we can chat further on the details of the project.

Title: Genome-wide identification and expression analysis of targeted transcription factor family in Avena sativa L.

Supervisor: Sajeevan Radha Sivarajan (sajeevan.radha.sivarajan@slu.se), Department of Plant Protection, SLU

Brief description:

The oat (Avena sativa) genome has recently been sequenced from Sweden (Kamal et al., 2022). There are not many studies diverted toward understanding the gene families involved in drought and heat stress tolerance in oats. Many transcription factors (TFs) and kinase families contributing to drought and heat stress responses have been identified and reported in wheat and barley. A large proportion of genes in plant genomes (~10%) potentially encode TFs and substantial numbers of TFs are involved in stress tolerance [Franco-Zorrilla et al., 2014]. The TFs interact specifically with cis-elements in promoter regions of genes they regulate. Thus, it is essential to understand the TFs genomic structure and cis-elements in their promoters for any targeted modification to enhance stress tolerance.

Where you will work:

Control growth chambers for stress imposition and sample collection¸ Well-equipped labs for molecular work.

What you will become an expert:

Bioinformatics: Identify the transcription factor transcripts from the oat genome and various analyses using different bioinformatics tools like Pfam (https://pfam.xfam.org/); functional and evolutionary relatedness through phylogenetic analysis with MEGA software; Gene Structure Display Server (http://gsds.cbi.pku.edu.cn/); MEME motif searching tool (http://meme-suite.org/); promoter analysis PlantTFDB (http://planttfdb.cbi.pku.edu.cn/); etc. You will also get to work with a wet lab for expression analysis like RNA isolation, cDNA conversion, and Real-Time PCR analysis.

Time Frame:

We are flexible and can discuss the time frame.

This will be a short-term (3-6 months) master's thesis project. If this interests you, please contact me, and we can chat further on the project details.

Title: Heat stress and male sterility in strawberry plants.

 Supervisor: Carolina Diller (carolina.diller@slu.se), Department of Plant Protection, SLU

Brief description:

Due to climate change, plants are increasingly exposed to heat waves when flowering. This is bad news for the temperature sensitive pollen grains, as high temperatures can lead to increased pollen sterility.

Interested in being part of the solution?

In this project, we will be screening for pollen heat tolerant genotypes in the strawberry wild crop relative, Fragaria vesca (smultron), and also across some garden strawberry cultivars.

This project entails:

• greenhouse, growth chamber work
• lots of microscope work (counting pollen grains)
• and perhaps working with pollinators as well.

Time Frame:

We are flexible and can discuss the time frame.

If this interests you, please contact me and we can chat further on the details of the project. This project most likely will have room for two master projects. First come, first serve!