Plant biologist
Ralf Reski
Reski in 2018
Born (1958-11-18 ) 18 November 1958 (age 65)
Ralf Reski (born 18 November 1958 in
Gelsenkirchen ) is a German
professor of plant
biotechnology and former
dean of the
Faculty of Biology of the
University of Freiburg .
[1] He is also affiliated to the
French
École supérieure de biotechnologie Strasbourg (ESBS)
[2] and Senior Fellow at the
Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies .
[3]
Biography
Ralf Reski studied
biology ,
chemistry and
pedagogy at the Universities of
Giessen and
Hamburg .
He was awarded his doctorate in
Genetics in 1990 by the
University of Hamburg and received his
habilitation in
General Botany in 1994.
From 1996 until 1999, he was a
Heisenberg -Fellow of the
German Research Foundation .
[4]
He was appointed
Distinguished Professor and entitled Ordinarius at the
University of Freiburg in 1999, where he became Head of the newly established Department of Plant
Biotechnology .
[5] From 2001 until 2011, Reski was Director Plant Biotechnology at the Centre for Applied Biosciences (ZAB, University of Freiburg).
[6]
From 2010 until 2019 he was elected senator and speaker in the academic senat of the university Freiburg.
[7]
Reski is founding
principal investigator (PI) of four Excellence Clusters: the Centre for Biological Signalling Studies (bioss),
[8] the Centre for Integrative Biological Signalling Studies (CIBSS),
[9] Living, Adaptive and Energy-Autonomous Materials Systems (livMATs),
[10] and of the
Spemann Graduate School of Biology and Medicine (SGBM).
[11] Since 2011, he also is Senior Fellow at the
Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (FRIAS). SGBM, bioss and FRIAS are funded within the
German Universities Excellence Initiative .
[12] Furthermore, Reski is a founding PI of the Freiburg Initiative for Systems Biology (FRISYS)
[13] funded by the
Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). Reski was one of the board members of the
International Union of Biological Sciences (IUBS) from 2009 to 2012.
[14] Since 2010, Reski is coordinator of QualFEEM, a
TEMPUS -project for the improvement of
Higher Education in the field of "environmental management and ecology" at the
Russian Universities in
Altai ,
Novosibirsk ,
Omsk and
Tyumen .
[15] In 2011 Reski was co-founder of the Trinational Institute for Plant Research (TIP).
[16]
In 2011 Ralf Reski was elected as lifetime member of the
Heidelberg Academy of Sciences and Humanities (German:
Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften ).
[17]
In 2012 he organized a Plant Biology Congress
[18] which attracted 1000 researchers from about 60 countries.
In 2013 Reski became senior fellow at the
University of Strasbourg Institute for Advanced Study (USIAS).
[19]
In 2015 he became the project coordinator of the
Erasmus Programme "Trans-regional environmental awareness for sustainable usage of water resources" – in short TREASURE-WATER
[20] that addresses higher education and training for the sustainable management of shared natural water resources in the area of the
Russian Federation and
Kazakhstan .
[21]
Research
Moss bioreactor with
Physcomitrella patens
Reski's main area of research with more than 250 scientific publications
[22] comprises the
genetics ,
proteomics ,
metabolism , and
cell development of
moss plants, using the technique of
homologous recombination for creating
knockout mosses by
gene targeting in a
reverse genetics approach.
[23]
Reski and his coworkers have identified hitherto unknown genes with biotechnological implication for
agriculture and
forestry .
[24]
The cultivation of moss cells and their utilization for
Molecular Farming is another main focal point of his research.
[25]
In 1998, Reski proposed the moss
Physcomitrella patens as a
model plant in biological research.
[26] Since then, he has contributed significantly towards mosses becoming a model plant in biological research on a worldwide scale. In 2004, Reski and colleagues from the United States, the
United Kingdom and
Japan successfully proposed the
genome of Physcomitrella patens for complete sequencing at the
Joint Genome Institute (JGI), a facility of the
U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) .
[27] The genome was released in December 2007,
[28] with the bioinformatic work spearheaded by Reski's group
[29] and financed by the German National Science Foundation (
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft DFG).
To date, the Freiburg Chair of Plant Biotechnology hosts an online database of Physcomitrella patens comprising the genomic sequence, annotated gene models and supplemental information.
[30]
Due to its scientific and economic importance, the genome of Physcomitrella patens has been chosen as a "flagship plant genome" by the DOE JGI in 2010.
[31]
Also in 1998, Reski and coworkers generated a
knockout moss by
deleting an
ftsZ gene and thus identified the first gene essential in the division of an organelle in any eukaryote.
[32]
Based on the results of further research on the ftsZ-gene family, Ralf Reski coined the term "
plastoskeleton ", analogous to the term "
cytoskeleton ", in 2000 and presented a new concept in
cell biology of how
chloroplasts , the green cell
organelles of plants, change shape and divide.
[33]
[34]
[35]
In 1999, the chemical company
BASF invested more than 30 Mio.
DM in a four-year cooperation project with Reski to identify new genes which may be able to make
crop plants more resistant to
drought ,
cold and attack by
pests . Plants with improved
nutritional value (
vitamins or polyunsaturated
fatty acids ) have also been in the research focus of their collaboration.
[36]
In the same year, Reski invented the
moss bioreactor
[37] and founded "greenovation Biotech GmbH",
[38] a biotechnology company utilizing moss bioreactors for the production of
pharmaceuticals .
[39] In 2011, Reski and coworkers produced recombinant, biologically active human
factor H in a moss bioreactor.
[40] In 2017 the first
clinical trial
phase 1 was completed testing the
enzyme
Alpha-galactosidase , which was produced in moss, to treat
Fabry disease .
[41]
In 2010, Reski established the
International Moss Stock Center (IMSC), which stores and freely distributes moss strains,
transgenics and
ecotypes . The IMSC assigns accession numbers that can be used in scientific publications to facilitate identification and availability of the respective samples.
[42]
Also in 2010, Reski and colleagues discovered a new mechanism of
gene regulation ; the
epigenetic
gene silencing by
microRNAs .
[43]
[44]
Reski is directly involved in
Mossclone , a European project (7th Framework Programme, FP7) which started in 2012 and aims to develop an air quality monitoring tool by using devitalized moss clones.
In 2016, Reski and colleagues identified a
homeobox gene as
master regulator for
embryo development
[45] and a basic genetic toolkit for
stoma development
[46] and in 2017 they described that the moss
cuticle was ancestral to
lignin
evolution .
[47]
In 2018, Reski and colleagues analysed the six
RecQ proteins in
Physcomitrella patens and in
Arabidopsis thaliana .
[48] They found that
moss RecQ4, the
ortholog of the human
Bloom syndrome protein , acts as a
repressor of
homologous recombination , protects the
genome from
mutations , and is pivotal for
embryogenesis and subsequent
plant development .
[48] In contrast, moss RecQ6 acts as a potent enhancer of
gene targeting .
[49]
In 2023, Reski and colleagues published the genome sequence of a
living fossil , the
moss
Takakia
lepidozioides from
Tibet . It faces
extinction due to
climate change .
[50]
Scientific board memberships
Editorial board memberships of scientific journals
2002–2012
Plant Cell Reports
[58]
[59]
2004–2006 Plant Biology (Guest-Editor)
2008–2013 Journal of Biomedicine and Biotechnology
[60]
2009–2012 Plant Cell Reports, editor-in-chief
[61]
2010–2012 Biology International
[62]
See also
References
^
"Curriculum Vitae (CV) Prof. Dr. Ralf Reski" (PDF) . plant-biotech.net . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Accueil" . ESBS – Université de Strasbourg . Archived from
the original on Jan 5, 2022. Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Ralf Reski" . FRIAS . Archived from
the original on 1 April 2012. Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Ralf Reski" . ResearchGate . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Ralf Reski - a risk taker who enjoys his work" . bio-pro.de . Archived from
the original on 27 March 2012. Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Plant Biotechnology" . Zentrum für Angewandte Biowissenschaften . Archived from
the original on 2011-09-17.
^
"Senat, Senatsausschüsse und -kommissionen – Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg" .
^
"bioss homepage" . Archived from
the original on 19 May 2012. Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Investigators" . www.cibss.uni-freiburg.de . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"FIT Freiburger Zentrum für interaktive Werkstoffe und bioinspirierte Technologien" . www.fit.uni-freiburg.de . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
Profile on SGBM homepage
^
"Homepage University of Freiburg, Excellence Initiative" . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"FRISYS – Freiburg Initiative for Systems Biology" . 6 March 2012. Archived from
the original on 6 March 2012. Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
Former board members of the IUBS
^
"CORDIS | European Commission" . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
Official TIP homepage
^
"HAW members since 1909" . www.haw.uni-heidelberg.de . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Think globally, act locally - Plant Biology Congress 2012 — Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies" . Archived from
the original on 2013-01-06. Retrieved 2012-12-02 .
^
"Ralf Reski < Freiburg-Strasbourg Fellows 2013 < Fellows" . Archived from
the original on 2013-11-01. Retrieved 2013-10-30 .
^
"New curricula for a valuable resource – Office of University and Science Communications" . www.pr.uni-freiburg.de . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Welcome" . treasure-water.eu . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"ReskiLab publications" . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^ Reski, Ralf (1998). "Physcomitrella and Arabidopsis: The David and Goliath of reverse genetics". Trends in Plant Science . 3 (6): 209–210.
doi :
10.1016/S1360-1385(98)01257-6 .
^ Reski, R.; Frank, W (2005).
"Moss (Physcomitrella patens) functional genomics -- Gene discovery and tool development, with implications for crop plants and human health" . Briefings in Functional Genomics and Proteomics . 4 (1): 48–57.
doi :
10.1093/bfgp/4.1.48 .
PMID
15975264 .
^ Decker, Eva L.; Reski, Ralf (2007). "Moss bioreactors producing improved biopharmaceuticals". Current Opinion in Biotechnology . 18 (5): 393–8.
doi :
10.1016/j.copbio.2007.07.012 .
PMID
17869503 .
^ Reski, R. (1998).
"Development, genetics and molecular biology of mosses" (PDF) . Botanica Acta . 111 : 1–15.
doi :
10.1111/j.1438-8677.1998.tb00670.x .
^
"Our Projects" . DOE Joint Genome Institute . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^ Rensing, Stefan A.; Lang, Daniel; Zimmer, Andreas D.; Terry, Astrid; Salamov, Asaf; Shapiro, Harris; Nishiyama, Tomoaki; Perroud, Pierre-François; Lindquist, Erika A.; Kamisugi, Yasuko; Tanahashi, Takako; Sakakibara, Keiko; Fujita, Tomomichi; Oishi, Kazuko; Shin-i, Tadasu; Kuroki, Yoko; Toyoda, Atsushi; Suzuki, Yutaka; Hashimoto, Shin-ichi; Yamaguchi, Kazuo; Sugano, Sumio; Kohara, Yuji; Fujiyama, Asao; Anterola, Aldwin; Aoki, Setsuyuki; Ashton, Neil; Barbazuk, W. Brad; Barker, Elizabeth; Bennetzen, Jeffrey L.; Blankenship, Robert (2008). "The Physcomitrella Genome Reveals Evolutionary Insights into the Conquest of Land by Plants". Science . 319 (5859): 64–9.
Bibcode :
2008Sci...319...64R .
doi :
10.1126/science.1150646 .
hdl :
11858/00-001M-0000-0012-3787-A .
PMID
18079367 .
S2CID
11115152 .
^ Schiermeier, Quirin (1999).
"German/Swedish venture creates plant biotechnology giant" . Nature . 397 (6717): 283.
Bibcode :
1999Natur.397..283S .
doi :
10.1038/16754 .
PMID
9950417 .
^
database cosmoss.org
^
"Genome Sequencing Center – Providing high-quality whole genome sequencing, assembly and analysis" . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^ Strepp, René; Scholz, Sirkka; Kruse, Sven; Speth, Volker; Reski, Ralf (1998).
"Plant Nuclear Gene Knockout Reveals a Role in Plastid Division for the Homolog of the Bacterial Cell Division Protein FtsZ, an Ancestral Tubulin" . Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America . 95 (8): 4368–73.
Bibcode :
1998PNAS...95.4368S .
doi :
10.1073/pnas.95.8.4368 .
JSTOR
44902 .
PMC
22495 .
PMID
9539743 .
^ Kiessling, J.; Kruse, S.; Rensing, S. A.; Harter, K.; Decker, E. L.; Reski, R. (2000).
"Visualization of a Cytoskeleton-like Ftsz Network in Chloroplasts" . The Journal of Cell Biology . 151 (4): 945–50.
doi :
10.1083/jcb.151.4.945 .
PMC
2169431 .
PMID
11076976 .
^ McFadden, G. I. (2000).
"Skeletons in the Closet: How Do Chloroplasts Stay in Shape?" . The Journal of Cell Biology . 151 (4): F19–22.
doi :
10.1083/jcb.151.4.F19 .
PMC
2169437 .
PMID
11076959 .
^ Reski, Ralf (2002). "Rings and networks: The amazing complexity of FtsZ in chloroplasts". Trends in Plant Science . 7 (3): 103–5.
doi :
10.1016/S1360-1385(02)02232-X .
PMID
11906832 .
^ Schiermeier, Quirin (1999).
"German/Swedish venture creates plant biotechnology giant" . Nature . 397 (6717): 283.
Bibcode :
1999Natur.397..283S .
doi :
10.1038/16754 .
^ Patent "Production of proteinaceous substances", on
WIPO -database:
[1]
^
Homepage greenovation Biotech GmbH, Profile of Ralf Reski
Archived 2011-11-09 at the
Wayback Machine
^ Decker, Eva L.; Reski, Ralf (2007). "Current achievements in the production of complex biopharmaceuticals with moss bioreactors". Bioprocess and Biosystems Engineering . 31 (1): 3–9.
doi :
10.1007/s00449-007-0151-y .
PMID
17701058 .
S2CID
4673669 .
^ Büttner-Mainik, Annette; Parsons, Juliana; Jérôme, Hanna; Hartmann, Andrea; Lamer, Stephanie; Schaaf, Andreas; Schlosser, Andreas; Zipfel, Peter F.; Reski, Ralf; Decker, Eva L. (2011).
"Production of biologically active recombinant human factor H in Physcomitrella" . Plant Biotechnology Journal . 9 (3): 373–83.
doi :
10.1111/j.1467-7652.2010.00552.x .
PMID
20723134 .
^ Greenovation gelingt der Durchbruch
Portal goingpublic
^
"Mosses, deep-frozen" . Hochschul- und Wissenschaftskommunikation . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^ Khraiwesh, Basel; Arif, M. Asif; Seumel, Gotelinde I.; Ossowski, Stephan; Weigel, Detlef; Reski, Ralf; Frank, Wolfgang (2010).
"Transcriptional Control of Gene Expression by MicroRNAs" . Cell . 140 (1): 111–22.
doi :
10.1016/j.cell.2009.12.023 .
PMID
20085706 .
S2CID
4672676 .
^
Discovery: microRNAs can dirtectly turn off genes
^ Horst, Nelly A.; Katz, Aviva; Pereman, Idan; Decker, Eva L.; Ohad, Nir; Reski, Ralf (2016). "A single homeobox gene triggers phase transition, embryogenesis and asexual reproduction". Nature Plants . 2 (2): 15209.
doi :
10.1038/nplants.2015.209 .
PMID
27250874 .
S2CID
4677699 .
^ Chater, Caspar C.; Caine, Robert S.; Tomek, Marta; Wallace, Simon; Kamisugi, Yasuko; Cuming, Andrew C.; Lang, Daniel; MacAlister, Cora A.; Casson, Stuart; Bergmann, Dominique C.; Decker, Eva L.; Frank, Wolfgang; Gray, Julie E.; Fleming, Andrew; Reski, Ralf; Beerling, David J. (2016).
"Origin and function of stomata in the moss Physcomitrella patens" (PDF) . Nature Plants . 2 (12): 16179.
doi :
10.1038/NPLANTS.2016.179 .
PMC
5131878 .
PMID
27892923 .
^ Renault, Hugues; Alber, Annette; Horst, Nelly A.; Basilio Lopes, Alexandra; Fich, Eric A.; Kriegshauser, Lucie; Wiedemann, Gertrud; Ullmann, Pascaline; Herrgott, Laurence; Erhardt, Mathieu; Pineau, Emmanuelle; Ehlting, Jürgen; Schmitt, Martine; Rose, Jocelyn K. C.; Reski, Ralf; Werck-Reichhart, Danièle (2017).
"A phenol-enriched cuticle is ancestral to lignin evolution in land plants" . Nature Communications . 8 : 14713.
Bibcode :
2017NatCo...814713R .
doi :
10.1038/ncomms14713 .
PMC
5344971 .
PMID
28270693 . .
^
a
b Wiedemann, Gertrud; Van Gessel, Nico; Köchl, Fabian; Hunn, Lisa; Schulze, Katrin; Maloukh, Lina; Nogué, Fabien; Decker, Eva L.; Hartung, Frank; Reski, Ralf (2018).
"RecQ Helicases Function in Development, DNA Repair, and Gene Targeting in Physcomitrella patens" . The Plant Cell . 30 (3): 717–736.
doi :
10.1105/tpc.17.00632 .
PMC
5894843 .
PMID
29514942 .
^ Eckardt, Nancy (24 May 2018).
"RecQ Proteins: Masters of Genome Surveillance" . Plantae . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^ Ruoyang Hu, Xuedong Li, Yong Hu, Runjie Zhang, Qiang Lv, Min Zhang, Xianyong Sheng, Feng Zhao, Zhijia Chen, Yuhan Ding, Huan Yuan, Xiaofeng Wu, Shuang Xing, Xiaoyu Yan, Fang Bao, Ping Wan, Lihong Xiao, Xiaoqin Wang, Wei Xiao, Eva L. Decker, Nico van Gessel, Hugues Renault, Gertrud Wiedemann, Nelly A. Horst, Fabian B. Haas, Per K.I. Wilhelmsson, Kristian K. Ullrich, Eva Neumann, Bin Lv, Chengzhi Liang, Huilong Du, Hongwei Lu, Qiang Gao, Zhukuan Cheng, Hanli You, Peiyong Xin, Jinfang Chu, Chien-Hsun Huang, Yang Liu, Shanshan Dong, Liangsheng Zhang, Fei Chen, Lei Deng, Fuzhou Duan, Wenji Zhao, Kai Li, Zhongfeng Li, Xingru Li, Hengjian Cui, Yong E. Zhang, Chuan Ma, Ruiliang Zhu, Yu Jia, Meizhi Wang, Mitsuyasu Hasebe, Jinzhong Fu, Bernard Goffinet, Hong Ma, Stefan A. Rensing, Ralf Reski, Yikun He: Adaptive evolution of the enigmatic Takakia now facing climate change in Tibet
doi :
10.1016/j.cell.2023.07.003
^
"Biotechnology / Life Sciences in Baden-Württemberg BIOPRO Baden-Württemberg: 10 years" . www.bio-pro.de . Archived from
the original on 2014-08-31.
^ Zeitung, Badische (25 April 2009).
"Gentechnik – die grüne Gefahr? – Bildung & Wissen – Badische Zeitung" . www.badische-zeitung.de . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
Innovationsrat Baden-Württemberg
Archived 2015-02-19 at the
Wayback Machine
^
"Vorstand – Deutsches Nationalkomitee (DNK) der IUBS und IUMS" . www.iubs-member-germany.de . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
VBIO Advisory board
^
"IUBS board" . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Meldungen aus dem Rektorat: Bestellung des wissenschaftlichen Beirats des CeBiTec" . ekvv.uni-bielefeld.de . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Plant Cell Reports" .
^
"Plant Cell Reports" .
^
"Pesticide Study Sparks Backlash" . www.science.org . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
"Plant Cell Reports" . Springer . Retrieved 5 January 2022 .
^
Editorial board Biology International
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