Faculty

Huq, Enamul
Associate Professor in Molecular Cell & Developmental Biology

E-mail

Website

Main Office: BIO 21B
Phone: 471-9848

Alternate Office: BIO 21/22
Phone: 471-6658

Mailing Address:
The University of Texas at Austin - ICMB
1 University Station A6700
205 W. 24th St.
Austin, TX 78712-1095

Graduate Student

• Mulekar, Jidnyasa - Graduate Student
• Sharma, Nidhi - Graduate Student
• Zhu, Ling - Graduate Student

Post Doctoral

• bu, Qingyun - Post Doctoral
• Chen, Fulu - Post Doctoral



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Research Summary:

Our research is aimed at understanding light signal transduction, specifically those pathways mediated by the phytochrome (phy) family of sensory photoreceptors that absorb light in the red and far-red region of the spectrum. The phy system, consisting of five members in Arabidopsis (phyA-phyE), controls almost every aspect of the plant life cycle including seed germination, de-etiolation and flowering time. To understand early phy signaling events, phy interacting factors, such as PIF1, have been isolated and characterized. PIF1 is a basic helix-loop-helix (bHLH) transcription factor that interacts strongly with the biologically active form of phyA and phyB. PIF1 overexpression and pif1 mutants showed defective seedling de-etiolation including, aberrant hypocotyl elongation and developmentally regulated loss of greening, suggesting that PIF1 is a key regulator of the phy-mediated control of seedling de-etiolation process. Future projects include investigating the molecular function of PIF1, identifying and functionally characterizing PIF1 interacting proteins and PIF1 target genes using biochemical, genetic and functional genomic approaches.


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Publications:

2011	Bu, Q., Zhu, L., Dennis, M., Yu, L., Lu, S.X., Person, M.D., Tobin, E.M., Browning, K. and Huq, E., Phosphorylation by CK2 enhances the rapid light-induced degradation of PHYTOCHROME INTERACTING FACTOR 1 in Arabidopsis, J. Biol. Chem. 286:12066-12074..
2010	Toledo-Ortíz, G., Huq, E. and Rodríguez-Concepción, M., Direct regulation of phytoene synthase gene expression and carotenoid biosynthesis by Phytochrome-Interacting Factors., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 107:11626-11631.
2008	Shen, H., Ling, Z., Castillon, A., Majee, M., Downie, B. and Huq, E. , Light-induced phosphorylation and degradation of the negative regulator PIF1 depends upon its direct physical interactions with photoactivated phytochromes, Plant Cell 20:1586-1602.
2008	Moon, J., Zhu, L., Shen, H. and Huq, E., PIF1 directly and indirectly regulates chlorophyll biosynthesis to optimize the greening process in Arabidopsis, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 105:9433-9438.
2004	Huq, E., Al-Sady, B., Hudson, M.E., Kim, C., Apel, K. and Quail, P.H. , PHYTOCHROME-INTERACTING FACTOR 1 is a critical bHLH regulator of chlorophyll biosynthesis. , Science 305:1937-1941..