Chuanyou LiDr. Chuanyou Li received his Ph. D. in Genetics at the Institute of Genetics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) in 1999. He did his post-doc training from1999 to 2003 in the DOE-Plant Research Laboratory (PRL) at Michigan State University. Since 2003 he serves as a professor and group leader at the State Key Laboratory of Plant Genomics, Institute of Genetics & Developmental Biology, CAS. Research in the Chuanyou Li laboratory is aimed at understanding the action mechanisms of jasmonate, which plays vital roles in regulating plant immunity and a wide range of developmental processes. Dr. Li and his colleagues found that the long-distance mobile signal in regulating systemic plant immunity is jasmonate, rather than the peptide systemin. He led more than 60 Chinese Scientists to take part in the International Tomato Genome Consortium and successfully decoded the genome of tomato, a unique model system for plant immunity and fruit biology. He connected the PLETHORA stem cell transcription factor pathway to jasmonate signaling and illustrated a molecular framework for jasmonate-induced regulation of root growth through interaction with the growth hormone auxin. His lab has a long term focus on the transcriptional mechanism of MYC2, a basic-helix-loop-helix protein that regulates diverse aspects of jasmonate responses. He found that turnover of MYC2 stimulates its transcription activity, revealing an ''activation by destruction'' mechanism to regulate plant stress response and adaptive growth. He also linked MYC2 to the MED25 subunit of the Mediator complex in the transcription machinery. He has published more than 80 research papers in journals such as Nature, Nature Genetics, PNAS, Plant Cell and PLoS Genetics, which received more than 4000 citations. Dr. Li serves as editor for several international journals including Molecular Plant, Plant Molecular Biology and Annals of Botany. Read More Read Less