Professor Feng Chen from the Department of Plant Science, University of Tennessee visited the Fruit Science Institute in November 2012. During his stay, Professor Chen presented a lecture on “Functional Genomics of Plant Secondary Metabolism: Biosynthesis and Applications” on 5th November, and shared his experience studying abroad.
Professor Chen is interested in plant secondary metabolism, and described how they discovered novel genes that regulate plant metabolites, and found their roles associated with specific plant functions, i.e. terpene synthase and terpenoids that exist in flowers are important for the interaction with insects. Dr. Chen introduced the progress in model plants Arabidopsis and Rice, and communication and interaction between plants and insects.
