Mary Williams

I studied Biochemistry at Berkeley (BA), Plant Molecular Biology at Rockefeller (PhD), did a postdoc at Berkeley with Ian Sussex, and then spent 14 years as a Biology professor at Harvey Mudd College in Claremont, California. In 2009 I started working at the American Society of Plant Biologists as Features Editor of the journal Plant Cell and the developer of Teaching Tools in Plant Biology. My passion lies in making it a little bit easier for students of all ages to understand plants and plant science research. I live in Glasgow, Scotland, with my family and our much adored dog.

Advancing crop transformation in the era of genome editing

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You are probably familiar with the process of making a transgenic plant; gene identification, gene introduction into a plant cell via bombardment or Agrobacterium tumefaciens, selection of transformed tissue, and plant regeneration (as shown in the diagram from Teaching Tools in Plant Biology). Many of you have probably carried out the process, at least in … Read more

The Ethylene Receptor of a Cyanobacterium

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This Research in Focus is written by science writer Peter Minorsky (ASPB and Mercy College) who writes the monthly On the Inside column for Plant Physiology. This summary describes a paper by Lacey and Binder, to be published in the  July 2016 issue. The authors examine a putative ethylene receptor in cyanobacteria; this protein had … Read more

Plant Cell and Plant Physiology publishing workshops at Plant Biology 2016

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Did you know that ASPB is the publisher of two top plant science research journals? Publishing has always been a core part of ASPB’s mission. At Plant Biology 2016 (July 9 – 13 in Austin, Texas), you can meet, learn from and share you thoughts with the Editors-in-Chief of the ASPB journals. Publishing in and … Read more

Teaching Tools in Plant Biology articles and resources available on Plantae

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Did you know that you can now access the Teaching Tools in Plant Biology articles on Plantae? Teaching Tools in Plant Biology is a popular feature of The Plant Cell, but it’s also a little different than the usual Plant Cell content. Because of the way it is hosted on the journal website, it sometimes … Read more

An innate immunity pathway in moss

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Arabidopsis thaliana has been an excellent model for the dissection of molecular plant-microbe interactions, including responses to pathogens. Studies in Arabidopsis have identified core components of signaling pathways involved in sensing and responding to pathogen associated molecular patterns (PAMPs), which including chitin (a structural carbohydrate of fungal cell walls) and flagellin (an abundant bacterial protein). … Read more