Reactive Oxygen Species: Signaling Between Hierarchical Levels in Plants

Photosynthesis and the complex network within plants is becoming more important than ever, because of the earth’s changing climate. In addition, the concepts can be used in other areas, and the science itself is useful in practical applications in many branches of science, including medicine, biology, biophysics, and chemistry. This original, groundbreaking work by two highly experienced and well-known scientists introduces a new and different approach to thinking about living organisms, what we can learn from them, and how we can use the concepts within their scientific makeup in practice.

This book describes the principles of complex signaling networks enabling spatiotemporally-directed macroscopic processes by the coupling of systems leading to a bottom-up information transfer in photosynthetic organisms. Top-down messengers triggered by macroscopic actuators like sunlight, gravity, environment or stress lead to an activation of the gene regulation on the molecular level. Mainly the generation and monitoring, as well the role of reactive oxygen species in photosynthetic organisms as typical messengers in complex networks, are described. A theoretical approach according to the principle of synergetics is presented to model light absorption, electron transfer and membrane dynamics in plants. A special focus will be attended to nonlinear processes that form the basic principle for the accumulation of energy reservoirs and large forces enabling the dynamics of macroscopic devices.

This volume is a must-have for any scientist, student, or engineer working with photosynthesis. The concepts herein are not available anywhere else, in any other format, and it is truly a groundbreaking work with sure to be long-lasting effects on the scientific community.

Franz-Josef Schmitt, PhD, is a researcher and group leader at Technische Universität Berlin (TU Berlin). Dr. Schmitt holds a series of scientific awards and has authored more than 80 research papers, two patents, one book chapter and 200 presentations that draw upon his research in photosynthesis, nanobiophotonics, environmental spectroscopy and didactics. He is a Coordinating Editor for the journal, Optofluidics, Microfluidics and Nanofluidics, Guest Editor for the journal, NanoPhotoBioSciences, and he is has been heavily involved in academic affairs at TU Berlin in multiple departments and committees.

Suleyman I. Allakhverdiev, PhD, is the Head of the Controlled Photobiosynthesis Laboratory, Institute of Plant Physiology, in the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS), Moscow. He is also the Chief Research Scientist at the Institute of Basic Biological Problems within RAS, a professor at Moscow State University, a professor at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (State University), Head of Bionanotechnology Laboratory at the Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnologies, Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences, and an Invited-Adjunct Professor in the Department of New Biology at the Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science& Technology (DGIST), Daegu, Republic of Korea. He is Associate Editor of the International Journal of Hydrogen Energy, Associate Editor of the journal, Photosynthesis Research, Section Editor of BBA Bioenergetics, Associate Editor of Functional Plant Biology, Associate Editor of Photosynthetica, and a member of the editorial boards of 15 other international journals. He has been the Guest Editor of more than 30 special issues in peer-reviewed journals, and he has authored or co-authored over 400 papers in various scholarly journals. He has also written eight books and holds six patents. He has been working as a visiting professor in over 30 countries and has presented oral presentations at more than 80 international and national conferences. He has also organized ten international conferences on photosynthesis. and about 40 technical presentations.