Rebecca (BeKa) Leuschen-Kohl

This is a really unfortunate time to have the keys falling off of my keyboard 😂 I guess that's how you know it's time to graduate.

I chose a rotational program bc it allowed me to find the right fit for research/mentorship. Students, like me, who applied to programs that allowed them to explore their options during the first semester(s) will no longer be able to prepare their application after a full rotation experience.

NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP)

The NSF-GRFP Solicitation (finally) went live today!

Unfortunately, second-year PhD students are unable to apply. This decision will have direct impacts on graduate students who choose rotational PhD programs. 🧪🌱
www.nsf.gov/funding/oppo...

Cysteine-rich receptor-like kinases mediate Wall Teichoic Acid perception in Arabidopsis Plants and animals detect microbe-associated molecular patterns (MAMPs) to initiate defense responses. Both lineages employ pattern recognition receptors (PRRs), yet plant mechanisms for sensing Gram-...

Gram-positive bacterial MAMP sensed by a plant cysteine rich receptor kinase. I've been waiting for this preprint to drop. Nice story!
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Friends and Family - If you're interested in attending my dissertation seminar via Zoom (Oct 8th), please comment below and I will send you the information!

New profile pic, thanks to the Boilermaker Station photo booth at #Purdue!

Thanks so much!

Not a lot of time to bead lately, but look at these customs I made for a Purdue fan!

shawishmarket.com/Collegiate-E...
#beadwork #choctaw ##brickstitich #IndigenousArt

Thank you!! Glad you were able to be a part of it!

Pivot to Plants: Training Program for Plant and Data Science | Danforth Plant Science Center The Pivot2Plants Fellows Program is a 1-year training program for people interested in pivoting to a career in plant science or data science but have limited research experience.

Applications for the 2026 Pivot to Plants Fellows Program at the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center are now open.

Location: St. Louis, MO
Application Deadline: October 15, 2025
Dates: Jan. 5, 2026 – Dec. 23, 2026
Estimated Stipend: $37,275

Learn more: www.danforthcenter.org/our-work/edu...

This work explores how PTI responses like ROS amplitude/attenuation & MAPK phosphorylation are PRR-specific in tomato roots! We also show that root PTI is primarily located in the developing tissues of tomato, providing experimental insights for below-ground PTI assays, including ROS, MAPK, & DEGs.

Tomato Roots Exhibit Development‐Specific Responses to Bacterial‐Derived Peptides Pattern-triggered immune responses in roots are concentrated in the early differentiating regions in wild and domesticated tomatoes (Solanum pimpinellifolium and S. lycopersicum). Signalling compon...

🚨 New publication alert 🚨
Tomato Roots Exhibit Development-Specific Responses to Bacterial-Derived Peptides
🔗: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
Authors: R Leuschen-Kohl, R Roberts, @danimstevens.bsky.social, N Zhang, S Buchanan, B Pilkey, @gittacoaker.bsky.social , and A Iyer-Pascuzzi.

Tomato Roots Exhibit Development‐Specific Responses to Bacterial‐Derived Peptides Pattern-triggered immune responses in roots are concentrated in the early differentiating regions in wild and domesticated tomatoes (Solanum pimpinellifolium and S. lycopersicum). Signalling compon...

Updated link: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

This work explores how PTI responses like ROS amplitude/attenuation & MAPK phosphorylation are PRR-specific in tomato roots! We also show that root PTI is primarily located in the developing tissues of tomato, providing experimental insights for below-ground PTI assays, including ROS, MAPK, & DEGs.

Gateways to Graduate School Gateways to Graduate School

It's that time of year again!

If you or someone you know is thinking about applying to MS/PhD programs, I recommend checking out this website, structured from our fall-semester-only class AGR 490: Gateways to Graduate School!

#GradSchool #PhD #GradSchoolAdmissions #GatewaystoGradSchool

Excited (and a little bit nervous!) to be speaking tomorrow for the #ASPB #PlantBiologyGlobal Fostering Inclusion in Plant Biology session! I'll be speaking on my experience as an Indigenous student at Purdue and the support systems (@Purdue, in the community, among peers) I've had during my PhD.

My team has updated our free database of POSTDOC fellowships.

This database contains 286 entries. For each entry, we provide a link, short description, deadline, amount, and eligibility criteria.

Download this updated and expanded database here: research.jhu.edu/rdt/funding-...

Mentoring undergraduates is one of my favorite parts of the job 😍 I'm always so excited when I get to brag on their work. Congrats, Morgan!

Excited to share the latest microPublication from my mentee Morgan Murff (incoming PhD@UGA!) looking at root responses to bacterial MAMPs in pepper roots. Contrary to previous findings, Morgan showed that roots of some pepper varieties do respond to csp22(Rsol). 🌱
#plantpath #plantdisease #plantbio

Congrats to all! Such cool findings - and so very relevant to the future of crop engineering!

And just like that, my time at #2025ISMPMI is over. I had such a great time catching up with fellow friends and researchers from across the globe! Here's to the next two years of scientific discovery before we meet again. Tschüss und bis bald!

You designed binders for your favourite protein and wish there was a way to experimentally screen them within 24h w/ only a set of pipettes and a plate reader?

Check out our Cell-Free 2-Hybrid approach (CF2H)

Full post: tinyurl.com/48cz5nb6

Preprint: www.biorxiv.org/cgi/content/...

A man giving a talk at a lectern with the MPMI logo

Songyuan Zhang - what can we learn from natural variation that can inform receptor engineering?

Combined observed sequence variation with AlphaFold3 prediction to model and engineer the pattern recognition receptor FLS2, and then the pathogen peptide agonist flg22.
#2025ISMPMI

Fantastic work from @danimstevens.bsky.social!

www.instagram.com/reel/DMHxCut...

They were testing the acoustics in the church. You can see more videos on her Instagram about it!

The line behind us after the 1st concert started - we were about 300m from the front doors at this point:

Anna Lapwood (organist, Royal Albert Hall) was playing a free concert in Cologne tonight. Over 10,000 people showed up.

2 hours and 2 performances later, we didn't make it inside. We were this close 😭

#2025ISMPMI

A person giving a scientific presentation at a lit lectern with a conference logo on a stage. A slide is shown with information about verifying transgene-free plants

Wolf Frommer presents work from @healthycrops.bsky.social, a global collaboration to work on bacterial blight of rice.

They are transferring transgene-free, genome edited rice to different countries, with legal frameworks in place, to test resistance to Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae.
#2025ISMPMI