Applestorm

Winner of the 2024 call for projects.

This project will harness new developments in the imaging of the chemistry, orientation and mechanical properties of cell wall polymers for the multiscale characterization of plant biomass and its derived products. It will focuses on two groups of plant structures: 

• Primary cell walls and cuticle: apple, pear and tomato fruits.
• Secondary cell walls: maize stems.

Biomass will be characterized, before and after extraction, using a wide variety of methods and tools : 

• Correlative microscopy combining RAMAN.
• Multiphotonic second harmonic generation microscopy.
• Atomic force microscopy.
• Multispectral fluorescence life time imaging (FLIM).
• Direct Stochastic Optical Reconstruction Microscopy (dSTORM) super-resolution imaging.

dSTORM imaging, a promising tool:

To extend the resolution of dSTORM to ~15nm and the range of detectable polymer epitopes, new specific and high affinity fluorescent nanoprobes will be developed through synthetic biology.
The multiscale structural parameters can be used for the analysis of the biomass variability and for modeling of biomass quality traits.
The extended dSTORM toolbox will also be used to map epitopes on single polysaccharide molecules. This may eventually lead to the commercialization of equipment for polysaccharide characterization and quality control.

Finally, the in situ mobility of cell wall modifying enzymes (pectinases and cellulases) in different types of biomass will be assessed using single particle tracking and correlated with variation in pertinent biomass quality traits.
 

Project lifetime:
 

2024 - 2028

Scientific manager:
 

Alexis Peaucelle (INRAE)