Dr. Jianhua Zhu

Assistant Professor

Email: jhzhu@umd.edu
Office: 2130 Plant Sciences Building
Phone: 301.405.0920
Fax: 301.314.9308
Dr. Jianhua Zhu

Education:

  • B.S. in Biological Education from Anhui Institute of Education, Hefei, Anhui, China, 1998
  • Ph.D. in Plant Molecular Biology from Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 47907, 2004

Area of Specialization:

Salinity, drought, and low temperature are common environmental abiotic stress conditions that ultimately determine the distribution of land plants and adversely affect the agricultural productivity of crops worldwide.  My research interest is to understand the molecular mechanisms that plants have evolved to cope with environmental stresses. Most of my effort has been focusing on the identification of key components in signal transduction pathways for plant responses to environmental stresses, with the long term goal of developing new strategies to improve crop productivity and sustainability in agriculture and environment. We will elucidate abiotic stress tolerance mechanisms, including the roles of small RNAs and epigenetic regulation in various abiotic stress response pathways. Our ongoing projects include:

  • Determine the upstream signaling components in abiotic stress tolerance pathways. We will use mutants isolated through a bioluminescence-assisted genetic screen with plants expressing a homozygous cold and/or drought stress-inducible promoter fused with a firefly luciferase (LUC) reporter gene.
  • Identify salt tolerance determinants by characterization of salt hypersensitive mutants.
  • Investigate biological function of abiotic stress regulated non-coding small RNAs (miRNAs and siRNAs) and their target genes in plant stress responses.

Courses

PLSC601: Plant Genomics

Representative Publications:

    Selected Publications
  • He, X.-J., Hsu, Y-F., Pontes, O., Zhu, J., Lu, J., Bressan, R.A., Pikaard, C., Wang, C.-S. and Zhu, J.-K. (2009) NRPD4, a protein related to the RPB4 subunit of RNA polymerase II, is a component of RNA polymerases IV and V and is required for siRNA production, RNA-directed DNA methylation, and transcriptional gene silencing. Genes Dev. In press.
  • Zheng, X., Pontes, O., Zhu, J., Miki, D., Zhang, F., Li, W.X., Iida, K., Kapoor, A., Pikaard, C.S. and Zhu, J.-K. (2008). ROS3 is an RNA-binding protein required for DNA demethylation in Arabidopsis. Nature 455: 1259-1262.
  • Li, W.X., Oono, Y., Zhu, J., He, X.J., Wu, J.M., Iida, K., Lu, X.Y., Cui, X., Jin, H. and Zhu, J.-K. (2008). The Arabidopsis NFYA5 transcription factor is regulated transcriptionally and posttranscriptionally to promote drought resistance. Plant Cell 20: 2238-2251.
  • Zhu, J. (co-first author), Jeong, J., Zhu, Y., Sokolchik, I., Miyazaki, S., Zhu, J.-K., Hasegawa, P.M., Bohnert, H.J., Shi, H., Yun, D.-J. and Bressan, R.A. (2008) Involvement of Arabidopsis HOS15 in histone deacetylation and cold tolerance. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA. 105:4945-4950.
  • Zhu, J. (co-first author), Kapoor, A., Sridhar, V.V., Agius, F. and Zhu, J.-K. (2007) The DNA glycosylase/lyase ROS1 functions in pruning the DNA methylation patterns in Arabidopsis. Curr. Biol. 17: 54-59.
  • Zhu, J., Koo, Y.D., Jenney Jr., F.E., Adams, M.W.W., Zhu, J.-K., Yun, D.-J., Hasegawa, P.M. and Bressan, R.A. (2007) An enhancer mutant of the Arabidopsis salt overly sensitive 3 connects ion homeostasis to the oxidative stress response. Mol. Cell. Biol. 27:5214-5224.
  • Zhu, J., Dong, C.-H. and Zhu, J.-K. (2007) Interplays between cold responsive gene regulation, metabolism and RNA processing during plant cold acclimation. Curr. Opin. Plant Biol. 10: 290-295.
  • Zheng, X., Zhu, J., Kapoor, A. and Zhu, J.-K. (2007) Role of Arabidopsis Argonaute 6 in locus-specific heterochromatin siRNA accumulation, DNA methylation and transcriptional gene silencing. EMBO J. 26: 1691-1701.
  • Verslues, P.E., Batelli, G., Grillo, S., Agius1, F., Kim, Y.-S., Zhu, J., Agarwal, M., Katiyar-Agarwal, S. and Zhu, J.-K. (2007) Interaction of SOS2 with NDPK2 and catalases reveals a point of connection between salt stress and H2O2 signaling in Arabidopsis. Mol. Cell. Biol. 27:7771-7780.
  • Zhang, K., Vaniyambadi, V.S., Zhu, J., Kapoor, A. and Zhu, J.-K. (2007) Distinctive Core Histone Post-translational Modification Patterns in Arabidopsis thaliana. Plos ONE. 2:e1210.
  • Chinnusamy, V., Zhu, J. and Zhu, J.-K. (2007) Cold stress regulation of gene expression in plants. Trends Plant Sci. 12: 444-451.
  • Sunkar, R., Chinnusamy, V., Zhu, J. and Zhu, J.-K. (2007) Small RNAs as big players in plant abiotic stress responses and nutrient deprivation. Trends Plant Sci. 12:301-309.
  • Katiyar-Agarwal, S., Zhu, J., Kim, K., Fu, X., Agarwal, M., Huang, A. and Zhu, J.-K. (2006) The plasma membrane na+/H+ antiporter SOS1 interacts with RCD1 and functions in oxidative stress tolerance in Arabidopsis. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci.USA. 103: 18816-18821.
  • Lee, B.-H., Kapoor, A., Zhu, J. and Zhu, J.K. (2006) STABILIZED1, a stress-upregulated nuclear protein, is required for pre-mRNA splicing, mRNA turnover, and stress tolerance in Arabidopsis. Plant Cell 18: 1736-1749.
  • Chinnusamy, V., Zhu, J. and Zhu, J.-K. (2006) Gene regulation during cold acclimation in plants. Physiol. Plant. 126: 52-61.
  • Chinnusamy, V., Zhu, J. and Zhu, J.-K. (2006) Salt stress signaling and mechanisms of plant salt tolerance. Genet. Eng. (N Y) 27: 141-177.
  • Verslues, P.E., Agarwal, M., Katiyar-Agarwal, S., Zhu, J. and Zhu, J.-K. (2006) Methods and concepts in quantifying resistance to drought, salt and freezing, abiotic tresses that affect plant water status. Plant J. 45: 523-539.
  • Borsani, J.O., Zhu, J., Verslues, P.E. and Zhu, J.-K. (2005) Endogenous siRNAs derived from a pair of natural cis-antisense transcripts regulate salt tolerance in Arabidopsis. Cell 123: 1279-1291.
  • Gong, Z., Dong, C.-H., Lee, H., Zhu, J., Xiong, L., Gong, D., Stevenson, B. and Zhu, J.-K. (2005) A DEAD box RNA helicase is essential for mRNA export and important for development and stress responses in Arabidopsis. Plant Cell 17: 256-267.
  • Zhu, J., Shi, H., Lee, B.-h., Damsz, B., Cheng, S., Stirm, V., Zhu, J.-K., Hasegawa, P.M. and Bressan, R.A. (2004) An Arabidopsis homeodomain transcription factor gene, HOS9 mediates cold tolerance through a novel pathway. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 101: 9873-9878.
  • Zhu, J., Gong, Z., Zhang, C., Song, C.-P., Damsz, B., Inan, G., Koiwa, H., Zhu, J.-K., Hasegawa, P.M. and Bressan, R.A. (2002) OSM1/SYP61: a syntaxin protein in Arabidopsis controls abscisic acid-mediated and non-abscisic acid-mediate responses to abiotic stress. Plant Cell 14: 3009-3028.

 

MEMBERSHIP

  • 2000-Present American Society of Plant Biologists (ASPB)

SERVICE TO THE SCIENTIFIC COMMUNINITY

  • 2005-2009 Editor of Plant Signaling & Behavior
  • Ad hoc reviewer for manuscripts submitted to Plant Journal, Plant Physiology, Plant Science, New Phytologist, Planta, Plant Cell & Environment and Journal of Integrative Plant Biology.
  • Ad hoc reviewer for grant proposals submitted to USDA National Research Initiative (NRI) Plant Biology (B): Environmental Stress Program; and the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO, the Dutch Research Council) that manages the Dutch Russian scientific co-operation program.
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