Alonso-Stepanova Lab

A Postdoctoral Associate position is available in the Roeder Laboratory at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY with a focus on researching Polyploidy. Apply by March 1. Please spread the word. apps.hr.cornell.edu/recruiting/fac…

Congrats to Anna Yaschenko on the 6th paper from her dissertation work that is out today. It's a review on plant synthetic promoters that stems from the intro chapter of her PhD thesis. One more to go! frontiersin.org/journals/plant…

It was great to collaborate with you @AlonsoStepanova, as always 🤩 Congrats, Jade, for an amazing job! 🌱🧬🩷

Out now in @ThePlantJournal: A deep dive into translation in plants by Jade & Karen! 🧬🌱 What started as Jade’s prelim evolved into a fantastic review on plant translation, thanks to a great collaboration with Karen. Congrats on this excellent review! onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/tp…

We attempted to "clean up" the model of the auxin biosynthesis pathway in Arabidopsis using genetic, pharmacological, and metabolomic approaches. We show that the CYP71A, NIT, AMI, and IAMH gene families are all dispensable for auxin production via IAOx. academic.oup.com/plcell/article…

And last but not least, Chengsong and Katie's wonderful collaboration with Chase Beisel's group on a new genome editing tool based on targeted DNA ADP-ribosylation, is now published in Nature Biotechnology. nature.com/articles/s4158…

Chengsong's DASH cloning system for high-cargo gene stacking has also been published in the Plant Biotechnology Journal. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/pb…

It was a busy summer at the Alonso-Stepanova Lab with four manuscripts now published. Pathy, Mario, and Anna's EBSn ethylene reporter paper is now available in the Plant Biotechnology Journal. onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/pb…

The Alonso-Stepanova lab at NC State is hiring a postdoc! Join us to study plant regeneration in Arabidopsis using cutting-edge molecular genetics and synthetic biology. We're looking for a driven and ambitious recent PhD graduate. Apply here: jobs.ncsu.edu/postings/222065

Our work points to an undiscovered auxin biosynthesis pathway involving IAOx, particularly active in sur2 mutants. 🔎 Uncovering the genes and metabolic steps of this new route could improve our understanding of IAA synthesis in plants!

Our genetic and metabolic analysis shows that knocking out the CYP71A, NIT, and AMI gene families doesn't lead to auxin-deficient phenotypes or suppress the high-auxin defects of the sur2 mutant. This questions the physiological role of these genes in auxin production.

In the latest Mario's preprint, we show that the CYP71A, NIT, AMI, and IAMH gene families do not play a role in the IAOx-mediated auxin biosynthesis biorxiv.org/content/10.110…

Development of this new genetic tool was sparked by a spontaneous discussion at a scientific conference. One two-year NSF EAGER grant to jump-start the work and 5 more years of "side projects" by 18 talented scientists made EBSn possible. biorxiv.org/content/10.110…

Mario's vitamin C study uncovers an interesting link between this essential metabolite and the regulation of local auxin biosynthesis biorxiv.org/content/10.110…

Katie Vollen's PhD prelim exam writeup transformed into a nice review article on large DNA manipulation: Way to go, Katie! Beyond a few bases: methods for large DNA insertion and gene targeting in plants - Vollen - 2025 - The Plant Journal - onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.11…

𝐅𝐨𝐜𝐮𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰📚 Beyond a few bases: methods for large DNA insertion and gene targeting in plants🧬🌱 📖doi.org/10.1111/tpj.70… 🖊️Katie Vollen @ANStepanova45 @AlonsoStepanova 🗺️@NCState Large DNA insertions in plants are challenging, but new tools improve efficiency

If you're struggling to assemble large DNA constructs, check out Chengsong's DASH system, which combines Golden Gate cloning, recombineering, and site-specific recombinases to build multigene constructs of ~100kb. biorxiv.org/content/10.110…

Happy to have been able to contribute to the implementation of this exciting new genome editing tool coming out of the Chase Biesel lab! @BeiselLab Targeted DNA ADP-ribosylation triggers templated repair in bacteria and base mutagenesis in eukaryotes biorxiv.org/content/10.110…