Daniela Döben (Universität Münster)
Daniela Döben's Master thesis was awarded with the Prize for the Best Plant Science Master Thesis, which was carried out at Münster University in the year 2025 with the title:
Exploring cellular redox dynamics in Arabidopsis thaliana under stress
Döben used in vivo NADP redox biosensing and identified a redox transition that occurs in the cytosolic NADP pool as a new hallmark of PTI (Pattern Triggered Immunity) in plants, revealing a connection with the regulation of central metabolism.
Redox reactions are at the centre of the function of all cells since they underpin energy conversion, biosynthesis and stress responses.
In this study, Döben made use of fluorescent biosensors to investigate how the NADP redox state changes in plant cells in response to microbial elicitors. She employed mutants of the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana to specifically alter redox metabolism and to pinpoint the regulatory origin and significance of the redox transition.
Döben observed a transient reduction of NADP pool in the cytosol as a novel hallmark of the early plant immunity response. This finding contradicts previous assumptions that the NADP pool is oxidised due to the activation of NADPH oxidases. Instead, the transition is remarkably robust. While it strictly depends on the receptor-like kinase module, it is not affected by NADPH oxidase activity, which appears to make a negligible contribution to in vivo NADP redox balance.
The results demonstrate tight linkage between immune signalling and central metabolism in plants and reveal fast, active and specific induction of an immune-metabolic program that underpins plant-microbe interaction.
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Daniela Döben conducted this work at the Institute of Plant Biology and Biotechnology (IBBP) in the working group of Prof. Dr. Markus Schwarzländer.