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Professor Alistair M Hetherington

B.Sc., Ph.D.(St.And.)

 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6060-9203

  • BS8 1TQ

1982 …2020

Research output per year

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Personal profile

Research interests

The research in my group centres on understanding, at the cellular level, how plants respond to a changing environment. Specifically we are interested in identifying the individual components present in the intracellular signalling pathways responsible for coupling extracellular stimuli to their characteristic responses. To investigate this we focus on stomata, the pores found on the surfaces of leaves. Environmental signals regulate both stomatal development and the aperture of the stomatal pore and our current interests lie in the regulation of stomatal aperture and development by carbon dioxide, ABA and changes in atmospheric relative humidity. At the cellular level we maintain a strong interest in calcium-based intracellular signalling with ongoing research into long chain phosphorylated sphingoid base signalling and the mechanisms responsible for encoding information in, and decoding information from, stimulus-induced calcium elevations (calcium signatures). More recently, through our work on stomatal evolution, we have started to focus more on the evolution of signalling pathways. Although most of our work has been in Arabidopsis, recently we have worked on the model lower plant Selaginella and extended our work to barley and wheat. The cereal work, which we carry out with colleagues at Bristol and elsewhere, is very much in the context of Food Security where we are interested in investigating the potential of modifying stomatal behaviour and development with the aim of improving water use efficiency. This later area relates to Living With Environment Change research and here we are also interested, together with other colleagues at Bristol, in using crop albedo as a possible bio-geoengineering strategy to combat global warming.

Topics I am interested in:

  • guard cell signalling
  • the control of stomatal development by environmental signals
  • sphingosine-based signalling
  • the role of calcium as an intracellular second messenger
  • the evolution of intracellular signalling systems
  • the evolution of stomata
  • improving crop water use efficiency
  • crop albedo bio-geoengineering

Further information about my research can be found on the home page of my group.

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Projects

STOCOVAR: Fellowship Aude Coupel-Ledru

Hetherington, A. M.

1/09/18 → 31/08/20

Project: Research

Flour-Power: The power of glacial flour - A novel fertiliser for sustainable agriculture in the developing world

Wadham, J. L., Hetherington, A. M., Anesio, A. M. B., Ginn, F., Millner, N. R. & Burrow, S. G.

1/01/17 → 1/04/21

Project: Research

Transferring knowledge and expertise of how plants respond to drought and climate change gained from research in UoB to Sri Lanka to produce beneficial impacts on the cultivation of cinnamon and tea.

Hetherington, A. M.

23/10/18 → 31/07/19

Project: Other

Research Output

Cactus-based solids and bio-composites for energy dissipation in defence and biomedical applications.

Zampetakis, I., Hetherington, A., Perriman, A. & Scarpa, F., 1 Jan 2020, ECCM 2018 - 18th European Conference on Composite Materials. Applied Mechanics Laboratory, (ECCM 2018 - 18th European Conference on Composite Materials).

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference Contribution (Conference Proceeding)

    • Guard cells integrate light and temperature signals to control stomatal aperture

    Kostaki, K. I., Coupel-Ledru, A., Bonnell, V. C., Gustavsson, M. A. M., Sun, P., Mclaughlin, F., Fraser, D. P., Mclachlan, D. H., Hetherington, A. M., Dodd, A. N. & Franklin, K. A., 23 Jan 2020, In : Plant Physiology.

    Research output: Contribution to journal › Article (Academic Journal)

    • Phylogenomic evidence for the monophyly of bryophytes and the reductive evolution of stomata

    Harris, B. J., Harrison, C. J., Hetherington, A. M. & Williams, T., 18 Mar 2020, (Accepted/In press) In : Current Biology.

    Research output: Contribution to journal › Article (Academic Journal)

    Supervised Work

    An Investigation Into The Effect Of Nuclear And Cytoplasmic Calcium Signalling On Stomatal Opening, Closing And Development

    Author: Russell, P., 1 Oct 2019

    Supervisor: Franklin, K. (Supervisor) & Hetherington, A. (Supervisor)

    Student thesis: Master's Thesis › Master of Science (MSc)

    A Novel Stomatal Mutant Implicates Clathrin Mediated Endocytosis as a Factor in Arabidopsis Carbon Dioxide Signalling

    Author: Lamb, A., 25 Jun 2019

    Supervisor: Hetherington, A. (Supervisor) & Edwards, K. (Supervisor)

    Student thesis: Master's Thesis › Master of Science (MSc)

    File

    Involvement of circadian regulation and energy signalling in plant water use and development

    Author: Simon, N., 9 Nov 2018

    Supervisor: Dodd, A. (Supervisor) & Hetherington, A. (Supervisor)

    Student thesis: Doctoral Thesis › Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

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