John Clark Lagarias
Professor
jclagarias@ucdavis.edu

Molecular & Cellular Biology

Office
31A Briggs Hall
752-1865

Lab
31 Briggs
752-7026


Picture of J. Clark Lagarias
 
Degrees:
1979 PhD University of California, Berkeley Chemistry
1975 BA University of California, Berkeley Botany and Chemistry
Research Interests:
Molecular Photobiology
Research in my lab focuses on phytochromes, a family of light sensing biliproteins found in plants, photosynthetic bacteria and even nonphotosynthetic eubacteria and fungi, and cyanobacteriochromes, phytochrome-related biliprotein sensors that have proliferated in cyanobacteria. Phytochromes mediate responses mainly to red and far-red light in the environment that are particularly important to shade sensing. Cyanobacteriochromes sense light from the near UV to red region to optimize light energy conversion by the oxygenic photosynthetic apparatus. Our investigations are biochemical in nature focusing on structure-function and evolutionary relationships of these light sensors and the enzymes responsible for the synthesis of their linear tetrapyrrole (bilin) prosthetic groups. The long-term goal of these investigations is to rationally alter the natural responses of plants and cyanobacteria to their light environment for optimum biomass yield and/or light energy conversion.
http://www.mcb.ucdavis.edu/faculty-labs/lagarias/

Awards:
2001 Elected to the National Academy of Sciences
1999-2006 Paul K. and Ruth R. Stumpf Professor of Plant Biochemistry
Department and Center Affiliations:
NSF Center for Biophotonics Science and Technology (http://biophotonics.ucdavis.edu/)



Department of Plant Biology Secondary Member (http://www-plb.ucdavis.edu/)
Professional Societies:
American Society of Plant Biologists
CBS Graduate Group Affiliations:
Biochemistry, Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology  
Plant Biology  
Graduate Groups not Housed in CBS:
Chemistry  
Publications: Last updated 9/30/2009
  • Rockwell, N.C, Shang, L., Martin, S.S. and Lagarias, J.C. (2009) J.C. Distinct classes of red/far-red photochemistry within the phytochrome superfamily. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. (USA) 106, 6123-6127
  • Stoll, S., Gunn, A., Brynda, M., Sughrue, W., Kohler, A., Ozarowski, A., Fisher, A., Lagarias, J.C. and Britt, R.D. (2009) The structure of the biliverdin radical intermediate in phycocyanobilin:ferredoxin oxidoreductase identified by high-field EPR and DFT. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 131, 1986-1995.
  • Dasgupta, J., Frontiera, R.R., Taylor, K.C., Lagarias, J.C. and Mathies, R. A. (2009) Ultrafast Excited state isomerization in phytochrome revealed by femtosecond stimulated Raman spectroscopy. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. (USA) 106, 1784-1789
  • Hu, W., Su, Y-S. and Lagarias, J.C. (2009) A light-independent allele of phytochrome B faithfully recapitulates photomorphogenic transcriptional networks. Molecular Plant, 2, 166-182; doi:10.1093/mp/ssn086
  • Rockwell, N.C., Njuguna, S.L., Dwojak, S., Castillo, E., Roberts, L., Parson, V.L, Lagarias, J.C, and Spiller, S.S. (2008) A second conserved GAF domain cysteine is required for the blue/green photoreversibility of cyanobacteriochrome Tlr0924 from Thermosynechococcus elongatus. Biochemistry, 47, 7304-7316.
  • Su Y-S. and Lagarias JC (2007) Light independent phytochrome signaling mediated by dominant GAF-domain tyrosine mutants of Arabidopsis phytochromes in transgenic plants, Plant Cell (USA) 19, 2124-2139.
  • Tu SL, Rockwell NC, Lagarias, JC and Fisher AJ (2007). Insight into the radical mechanism of phycocyanobilin:ferredoxin oxidoreductase (PcyA) revealed by x-ray crystallography and biochemical analysis. Biochemistry 46, 1484-1494.
  • Miller AE, Fischer AJ, Laurence T, Hollars C, Saykally R, Lagarias JC and Huser T (2006) Single molecule dynamics of phytochrome-bound fluorophores probed by fluorescence correlation spectroscopy. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA) 103, 11136-11141.
  • Rockwell NC, Su Y-S and Lagarias JC (2006) Phytochrome structure and signaling mechanisms. Annual Review of Plant Biology 57, 837-858.
  • Tu S-L, Sughrue WL, Britt RD and Lagarias JC (2006) A Catalytic Histidine-Aspartate Pair in Exo-Vinyl Reduction of Biliverdin by Phycocyanobilin:Ferredoxin Oxidoreductase (PcyA). Journal of Biological Chemistry 281, 3127-3136.
  • Fischer AJ, Rockwell NC, Jang A, Ernst L, Waggoner A, Duan Y, Lei H-X and Lagarias JC (2005) Multiple roles of a conserved GAF domain tyrosine residue in cyanobacterial and plant phytochromes. Biochemistry 44, 15203-15215.
Laboratory Personnel:
31 Briggs Hall
http://www.mcb.ucdavis.edu/faculty-labs/lagarias/
Nathan Rockwell, Project Scientist; Wei Hu, Postdoc; Deqiang Duanmu, Postdoc; Shelley Martin, SRA; Timothy Butterfield, PBGG Graduate Student; Alexander King, Jr. Specialist; James Reilly, Jr. Specialist; Lisa Bhattacharyya, Lab Assistant

Teaching Interests:
Biochemistry laboratory. Bioinformatics. Signal transduction in plants.
Courses:
MCB 120L Biochemistry Laboratory