Education

• BSc, Agronomy, Faculty of Agronomy, University of Buenos Aires, 1982.
• Magister Scientiae, Faculty of Agronomy, University of Buenos Aires, 1987.
• PhD, University of Leicester, UK, 1989.

Positions

• Associate Professor (UBA)
• Principal Investigator (CONICET)

Research interests

• Genetic and molecular analysis of the action of phytochromes and cryptochromes.
• Functional Genomics.
• Photomorphogenesis in crops.

Awards

• Lorenzo Parodi Award, 1986-1988, Argentine Society of Botany.
• Fellow of the Guggenheim Foundation, 2002.
• Merit Diploma of Konex Foundation, 2003.

Editorial Boards

• Associate Editor of Plant Journal.
• Associate Editor of Plant Molecular Biology.
• Associate Editor of Photochemical and Photobiological Sciences.
• Associate Editor of Spanish Journal of Agricultural Sciences.
• Member of the Editorial Board of BMC Plant Biology.

Courses taught at Faculty of Agronomy (Univ. of B.A.)

• Control of growth and development in plants.

Students

• Past PhD students: Marcelo J. Yanovsky, Maria Agustina Mazzella, Karina A. Oliverio, Hernán Boccalandro, Julieta Mateos. Laura Luccioni.
• Past co-supervised PhD students: Pablo D. Cerdán, Gustavo A. Maddonni.
• Current PhD students: Sabrina Buchovsky, Santiago Trupkin, Romina Sellaro, Elizabeth Karayekov, María A. Crepy, Juan Ignacio Cagnola, Martín Krzymuski.

Publications (last 5 years)

• Staneloni, R.J., Battiller, M.J., Casal, J.J. (2008). Abscisic acid, high-light and oxidative stress down-regulate a photosynthetic gene via a promoter motif not involved in phytochrome-mediated transcriptional regulation. Molecular Plant 1: 75 - 83.
• Boccalandro, H.E., De Simone, S.N., Bergmann-Honsberger, A., Schepens, I., Fankhauser, C., Casal, J.J. (2008).

  PKS1 regulates root phototropism and gravitropism. Plant Physiology 146: 108-115.

• Mazzella, M.A. , Zanor, M.I., Fernie, R.A., Casal, J.J. (2008). Metabolic responses to red / far-red ratio and ontogeny show poor correlation with the growth rate of sunflower stems. Journal of Experimental Botany 59: 2469-2477.
• Schepens, I., Boccalandro, H.E., Kami, C., Casal, J.J. Fankhauser, C. (2008). PHYTOCHROME KINASE SUBSTRATE 4 modulates phytochrome-mediated control of hypocotyl growth orientation. Plant Physiology 147:661-671
• Ghiglione, H., Gonzalez, F., Serrago, R., Maldonado, S., Chilcott, C., Curá, J., Miralles, D., Zhu, T., Casal, J. J. (2008). Autophagy regulated by daylength determines the number of fertile florets in wheat. Plant Journal 55, 1010–1024.
• Buchovsky, A.S., Strasser, B., Cerdán, P.D., Casal, J.J. (2008). Suppression of pleiotropic effects of functional CRYPTOCHROME genes by TERMINAL FLOWER. Genetics 180, 1467 - 1474.
• Genoud, T., Schweizer, F., Tscheuschler, A., Debrieux, D., Casal, J.J., Schäfer, E., Hiltbrunner, A., Fankhauser, C. (2008). FHY1 mediates nuclear import of the light-activated phytochrome A photoreceptor. PLoS Genetics 4: e1000143.
• Oliverio KA; Crepy M; Martin-Tyron EL; Milich R; Harmer SL; Putterill J; Yanovsky MJ; Casal JJ. (2007). GIGANTEA regulates phytochrome A-mediated photomorphogenesis independently of its role in the circadian clock. Plant Physiology 144:495-502
• Trupkin SA; Debrieux D; Hiltbrunner A; Fankhauser C; Casal JJ. (2007). The serine-rich N-terminal region of Arabidopsis phytochrome A is required for protein stability. Plant Molecular Biology 63:669-678
• Cañamero RC; Boccalandro H; Casal JJ; Serna L. (2006). Use of confocal laser as light source reveals stomata-autonomous function. PloS ONE 1:e36.
• Faigón-Soverna A; Harmon FG; Storani L; Karayekov E; Staneloni RJ; Gassmann W; Más P; Casal JJ; Kay SA; Yanovsky MJ. (2006). A constitutive shade-avoidance mutant implicates TIR-NBS-LRR proteins in Arabodopsis photomorphogenic development. Plant Cell 18:2919-2928.
• Mateos JL; Luppi JP; Ogorodnikova OB; Sineshchekov VA; Yanovsky MJ; Braslavsky S; Gärtner W; Casal JJ. (2006). Functional and biochemical analysis of the N-terminal domain of phytochrome A. Journal of Biological Chemistry 281:34421-34429.
• Casal JJ. The photoreceptor interaction network. In: Schafer E, Nagy F (eds). (2006) Photomorphogenesis in Plants and Bacteria: Function and Signal Transduction Mechanisms, Dordrecht, pp 407-437.
• Alconada-Magliano, T; Botto, JF; Godoy, V; Lloyd, AM; Casal, JJ. (2005). New Arabidopsis recombinant inbred lines (Ler/No-O) reveal natural variation in phytochrome-mediated responses. Plant Physiology 138:1126-1135.
• Casal, JJ; Yanovsky, MJ. (2005). Regulation of gene expression by light. International Journal of Developmental Biology 49:501-511.
• Mazzella, MA; Arana, MV; Staneloni, RJ; Perelman, SB; Rodriguez Batiller, MJ; Muschietti, J; Cerdán, PM; Chen, K; Sánchez, RA; Zhu, T; Chory, J; Casal, JJ. (2005). Phytochrome control of the Arabidopsis transcriptome anticipates seedling exposure to light. The Plant Cell 17:2507-2516.
• Casal, JJ. (2005). Convergence of phytochrome and cryptochrome signaling. pp 285-292 in Wada, M; Shimazaki, K; Iino, M, editors. Light Sensing in Plants. Springer Verlag, Tokyo.
• Symonds, V. V., Godoy, A.V., Alconada, T. Botto, J.F., Juenger, T.E., Casal, J.J., Lloyd, A.M. (2005). Mapping quantitative trait loci in multiple populations of Arabidopsis thaliana identifies natural allelic variation for trichome density. Genetics 169: 1649-1658.
• Boccalandro, H.E., Rossi, M.C., Saijo, Y., Deng, X-W., Casal, J.J. (2004). Promotion of photomorphogenesis by COP1. Plant Molecular Biology 56, 905-915.
• Fankhauser, C., Casal, J.J. (2004). Phenotypic characterisation of a photomorphogenic mutant. Plant Journal 39, 747-760.
• Casal, J.J., Fankhauser, C., Coupland, G., Blázquez, M. A. (2004). Signalling for developmental plasticity. Trends in Plant Science 9, 309-314.
• Alconada Magliano, T., Casal, J.J. (2004). Pre-germination seed-phytochrome signals control stem extension in dark-grown Arabidopsis seedlings. Photochemical and Photobiological Sciences 3, 612-616.
• Botto, J. F., Alonso Blanco, C., Garzarón, I., Sánchez, R. A., Casal, J.J. (2003).The Cvi allele of cryptochrome 2 enhances cotyledon unfolding in the absence of blue light in Arabidopsis. Plant Physiology 133: 1547-1556.
• Perelman, S., Mazzella, M.A., Muschietti, J., Zhu, T., Casal, J.J. (2003). Finding unexpected patterns in microarray data. Plant Physiology 133, 1717-1725.
• Boccalandro, H., Ploschuk, E., Yanovsky, M., Gatz, C., Sánchez, R., Casal, J. (2003). Increased phytochrome B alleviates density effects on tuber yield of field potato crops. Plant Physiology 133, 1-8.
• Casal, J.J., Luccioni, L., Oliverio, K.A. y Boccalandro, H.E. (2003). Light, Phytochrome Signalling and photomorphogenesis in Arabidopsis. Photochemical and Photobiological Sciences 2, 625-636.
• Lariguet, P., Boccalandro, H., Alonso, J., Ecker, J., Chory, J., Casal, J., Fankhauser, C. (2003). A balance between PKS1 and PKS2 modulates phyA signalling. The Plant Cell. Vol 15, 1-14.

Complete publication list

Current research areas at IFEVA

• Light control of plant growth and development