Zhiming Ma: The Plant Cell First Author

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Zhiming Ma, first author of “Membrane nanodomains modulate formin condensation for actin remodeling in Arabidopsis innate immune responses”

Current Position: Postdoc research fellow, School of Biological Sciences, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

 Education: Ph.D., Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. M.S., Zhejiang University, China. B.S., China Agricultural University, China.

Non-scientific Interests: Swimming, Basketball, Cooking.

Brief bio: My research journey was started from 2013 when I joined Prof. Jiashu Cao’s group in Zhejiang University to pursue my Master’s degree.  My master dissertation focused on studying the function and regulation of miRNA in the pollen development of Chinese Cabbage (Brassica campestris ssp. chinensis), during which I started to be interested in developmental and cell biology in plant science.  In 2016, I moved to Singapore and started my PhD program in Prof. Yansong Miao’s lab where I focused on understanding phase separation and biomolecular condensation-regulated plant immune and developmental signalling. We found that the macromolecular condensation of formin proteins on plant host plasma membrane is the molecular swither for rapid actin cytoskeleton remodeling upon bacterial pathogen infection, which is indispensable for plant immune sigaling and the downstream immune responses. We also identified the scaffold factors to drive such formin condensation. Currently, I am working in Prof. Yansong Miao’s lab to further deepen our understanding of the machinery of biomolecular condensation-regulated biochemical activities of surface molecules.

 

Chinese version.

姓名：马智明

现任职位： 博士后 （新加坡南洋理工大学）

教育背景： 中国农业大学, 学士； 浙江大学, 硕士； 南洋理工大学, 博士.

 

兴趣爱好：游泳，篮球，烹饪。

科研背景简介： 我于2013年毕业于中国农业大学， 获得学士学位。同年， 我加入浙江大学农业与生物技术学院曹家树教授实验室攻读硕士学位。 在此期间，我的研究工作主要集中在鉴定和克隆白菜花粉特异表达的miRNA及其靶基因， 并研究其在白菜花粉发育过程中的功能。相关研究成果发表于Plant Mol Biol (2017)。随后， 我于2016年加入新加坡南洋理工大学生物学院缪岩松教授课题组攻读博士学位。我的博士研究课题主要集中在研究植物如何通过相分离和生物分子凝聚体调控其免疫或发育信号转导。我们发现细胞膜上formin蛋白（一种肌动蛋白结合蛋白）的凝聚是介导植物宿主在细菌侵染过程中快速重塑肌动蛋白细胞骨架的分子开关。而这种肌动蛋白细胞骨架的快速重塑对植物本身的免疫信号转导及下游的免疫反应至关重要。同时，我们还发现了介导这种细胞膜上formin蛋白凝聚的分子机理。 相关研究成果第一或共同第一作者发表于 PNAS (2019), New Phytol (2020), Life Sci. Alliance (2020), Cell Rep (2021)及The Plant Cell (2021)。博士毕业后， 我继续留在缪岩松教授实验室从事博士后研究，以期更加深入的学习细胞膜上的分子凝聚如何调控膜蛋白的生化活性并进而影响下游的多个生理过程。