Mia Lynn Swain: The Plant Cell Author
Mia Lynn Swain, co-first author of “The final piece of the Triangle of U: Evolution of the tetraploid Brassica carinata genome”
Current Position: Ph.D. student in Dr. Won Yim’s plant genomics lab in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Nevada, Reno, USA.
Education: B.S. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of Nevada, Reno.
Non-scientific Interests: Thrifting, sewing, and hiking
Brief bio: I joined Dr. Won Yim’s research group to study abiotic stress tolerance in plants with the ultimate goal of developing crops that are better able to adapt to global climate change. My research has involved two main ongoing projects. The first is to elucidate the molecular mechanisms that facilitate the conversion of photosynthetic states between C3 photosynthesis to the more water-use-efficient Crassulacean Acid Metabolism (CAM). My focus is to use a facultative CAM plant that can reversibly induce CAM photosynthesis under abiotic stress conditions to investigate the transcription factor regulatory network facilitating the stress-induced transition with the intent to develop crops that are more resistant to drought stress. My second ongoing project is the construction of the Brassica carinata genome assembly and subsequent investigations into polyploid evolution dynamics. I have been using comparative genomics to elucidate the genomic features, such as structural variants, that give rise to favorable agronomic traits.
