Chloroplasts are responsible for photosynthesis and CO2 capture in plants and algae. As such, the chloroplast is a key engineering target for crop biologists and biotechnologists to improve yields and resilience to climate change. Most of the genes associated with photosynthesis are encoded in the nuclear genome and their proteins must be imported into the chloroplast following translation. Thus, plants and algae rely heavily on communication between the nucleus and chloroplast to adjust and respond to the surrounding environment. This communication often entails intrinsic constraints that can reduce photosynthetic efficiency1.
One ambitious solution is to relocate photosynthesis-related genes from the nuclear genome to the chloroplast genome (the plastome). This can now be achieved relatively rapidly using recently developed synthetic biology approaches in the model green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii2. In this project you will build on recent progress in the McCormick lab towards relocating genes involved in CO2 capture (i.e., the Calvin-Benson-Bassham (CBB) cycle) to the chloroplast. This strategy offers several opportunities to develop exciting fundamental research and applied engineering approaches to increase CO2 capture rates, including optimizing individual components3, developing a more holistic approach to investigating regulation and flux through the CBB cycle4, and exploring the potential advantages of increasing chloroplast autonomy, for example, more rapid adaptation to environmental fluctuations.
This project is an outstanding multidisciplinary training opportunity to develop a wide range of molecular and whole organism analysis skills, including DNA, RNA and protein analyses (e.g., qRT-PCR, Western blot, mass spectrometry and enzyme activity assays), and photosynthetic physiology using gas exchange and fluorescence techniques. You will gain expertise in model-guided, engineering biology-based approaches including high throughput multi-gene cloning (e.g., Golden Gate) and screening, and state-of-the-art gene editing techniques (e.g., CRISPR-Cas). You will generate and characterize the growth phenotypes of multiple engineered algal strains. Your project will integrate with an international consortium (the Combining Algal and Plant Photosynthesis group) of UK and US plant and algal scientists actively collaborating with the McCormick Lab. Your findings will help to develop strategies to take important findings through to application in plants and crops, and you will present your research at regular meetings, including national and international conferences.
Please contact Alistair McCormick (alistair.mccormick@ed.ac.uk) directly if you are interested in this project.
Lab website: https://biology.ed.ac.uk/mccormick
Twitter tag: @McCormick_Lab
BlueSky tag: @mccormicklab.bsky.social
For more information on the project, eligibility and how to apply for the School's PhD programme, please click on the 'Visit Institution Website' link.
Applicants should apply to the School's Biological Sciences PhD programme via the University’s admissions portal (EUCLID) with a start date of 01 October 2026.
In the EUCLID application, applicants should state the project “Engineering CO2 capture in the plastome of the green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii”, the research supervisor (Prof Alistair McCormick) and the funding source they wish to be considered for (e.g. Darwin Trust).