Studying Plant Epigenetics to Make Food Crops Better

Dr. Tzung-Fu Hsieh is a scientist from the North Carolina State University (NCSU) Plants for Human Health Institute (PHHI) on the North Carolina Research Campus in Kannapolis. As a systems biologist, Hsieh studies the epigenetic interactions between components of different biological systems. Specifically, Hsieh researches gene imprinting, a process where one copy of a gene is expressed where the other is silent. Determining which gene plays which role depends on where each copy comes from: mother or father.

Hsieh studies a model system called arabidopsis, but he is hoping that his current epigenetics studies will be applicable to human food crop production in certain crops like rice.