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Professor Brendan Davies

  • Position: Professor
  • Areas of expertise: Plant development; regulation of gene expression; transcriptional repression; NMD, evolution.
  • Email: B.H.Davies@leeds.ac.uk
  • Phone: +44(0)113 343 3146
  • Location: 9.01, Miall 7.11 Miall

Profile

Our group studies plant development. We began by trying to understand flower development and still work in this area. Studying flower development and meristem function led us to the role of transcription factors, gene regulatory networks and the control of gene expression in developmental processes. This also led to an interest in other forms of gene regulation such as repression and mRNA stability. We welcome expressions of interest from prospective PhD students and postdoctoral fellows.

Individual projects are currently underway in the following broad areas:

  • Understanding flower development - the master regulators and their downstream targets.
  • The mechanism of transcriptional repression and its role in plant development and evolution.
  • Nonsense-mediated mRNA decay, how it works, what it does and how we can use it.

Plant Science

Ecology and Evolution

  • BBSRC: A Family of Transcriptional Co-repressors Controlling Multiple Processes in Plants.
  • BBSRC: BloomNet - Flowering time
  • BBSRC: A New Conditional Gene Regulation System in Plants
  • EU: Marie Curie SYSFLO network; transcriptional control in flower development
     
  • Pro-Dean for Research and Innovation from 1st Feb 2016
  • Member of Graduate School Committee
  • The Centre for Plant Sciences

Responsibilities

  • Pro-Dean for Research and Innovation

Research interests

Plant development; regulation of gene expression; transcriptional repression; NMD, evolution.

<h4>Research projects</h4> <p>Any research projects I'm currently working on will be listed below. Our list of all <a href="https://biologicalsciences.leeds.ac.uk/dir/research-projects">research projects</a> allows you to view and search the full list of projects in the faculty.</p>

Qualifications

  • BSc, London;
  • PhD 1991, CNAA.

Student education

Undergraduate project topics:

  • Plant development using molecular genetics

Postgraduate studentship areas:

  • Genes controlling plant development

See also:

Academic roles:

  • Pro-Dean for Research and Innovation - Pro-Dean for Research and Innovation from 1st Feb 2016

Committees:

  • Member of Graduate School Committee (Pro-Dean for Research & Innovation)

Current postgraduate researchers

<h4>Postgraduate research opportunities</h4> <p>We welcome enquiries from motivated and qualified applicants from all around the world who are interested in PhD study. Our <a href="https://phd.leeds.ac.uk">research opportunities</a> allow you to search for projects and scholarships.</p>