Understanding how plants regulate synthesis of both oil and protein in seeds continues to be key to enhancing crops. Check this out! PII interactions with the acetyl-CoA carboxylase subunits BADC and BCCP co-regulate lipid and nitrogen metabolism in Arabidopsis url: academic.oup.com/plphys/artic...

Happy to share our most recent work and the insights into rational engineering of plant oil biosynthesis! Complete replacement of Arabidopsis oil-producing enzymes with heterologous diacylglycerol acyltransferases url: academic.oup.com/plphys/artic...

Novel discovery leads to new grant studying oil production in canola and related crops news.wsu.edu/news/2025/11...

Plant provide food, chemicals, and bio-materials essential for society. We need more scientists to help increase plant yield, increase resistance to pathogens, and develop the designer crops of the future. Check out Molecular Plant Sciences graduate program at Washington State University mps.wsu.edu

The Bates lab had a great time presenting at the European Symposium on Plant Lipids in Bonn Germany. Graduate student Sean McGuire did a great job, and I didn't see anyone sleeping during my presentation so that is always a bonus!

Ever notice analytical methods based on one species/tissue tend to not work well when you change species? In our recent publication we optimized methods to analyze seed oil content from 7 species with large differences in seed size and fatty acid composition. link.springer.com/10.1186/s130...

I'm excited to share this collaborative work investigating the metabolic rearrangements that occur when fatty acid synthesis is deregulated. pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/...

Excited to share this new collaborative work with my lab and Doug Allen and Melia Gehan labs at the Danforth Plant Science Center doi.org/10.1111/tpj....

The second article from my lab in the current Feb 2025 issue of Plant Physiology is this review together with collaborator Jay Shocky doi.org/10.1093/plph...

The current Feb 2025 issue of Plant Physiology has two articles from my lab, the first is identifying bottlenecks for production of oil in vegetative biomass tissues. doi.org/10.1093/plph...

I was honored to be part of the webinar!

#ASPBPlantPhysMonday #ICYMI

Sean McGuire senior grad student in the lab did a great job presenting his 3 minute thesis at the WSU Plant Molecular Sciences symposium.

Just a week left to apply for this postdoc position in my lab in Oxford.

Again for the Blue Sky community, here is one of the top publications from my lab from 2024. Discovery of the mechanisms to of a new pathway of plant oil biosynthesis! www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Since my lab is new here, here are some of our recent results! nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

This account is for updates from Bates plant lipid lab and all science relating to it. Prior account on Twitter was @BatesLipidLab that will no longer be active soon. We also have a Bates Lipid Lab facebook group.