Daphne Osborne
Encyclopedia
Daphne J. Osborne was a British plant scientist. Her research in the field of plant physiology
spanned five decades and resulted in over two hundred papers, twenty of which were published in Nature
. Her obituary in The Times
described her scientific achievements as "legendary"; that from the Botanical Society of America
attributed her success to "her wonderful intellectual style, combined with her proclivity for remarkable and perceptive experimental findings".
Her research focused on plant hormone
s, seed
biology and plant DNA repair
. She is best known for her work on the gas ethylene
, in particular for demonstrating that ethylene is a natural plant hormone
, and that it is the major regulator of ageing
and the shedding
of leaves and fruits. She also originated the concept of the target cell as a model for understanding plant hormone action.
, where her father was a colonial administrator, Osborne attended The Perse School
in Cambridge
. Her BSc in chemistry
and MSc in botany
were from King's College London
. Her PhD on the topic of plant growth regulators was from the University of London
at Wye College
, Kent
, where her supervisor was R. Louis Wain. Her first postgraduate position was in the Department of Biology of the California Institute of Technology
, USA, as a Fulbright Scholar
, where she worked with botanist Fritz Went, among others.
Much of Osborne's career was spent at the Agricultural Research Council
(ARC), later renamed the Agricultural and Food Research Council (AFRC). In 1952, she joined the ARC Unit of Experimental Agronomy at Oxford University, where she worked until the unit's closure in 1970. She then took up the position of deputy director at the new ARC Unit of Developmental Botany at the University of Cambridge
. During her time in Cambridge, she became the first female fellow of Churchill College
and also supervised the college's first female PhD student. After the unit's closure in 1978, she joined the AFRC Weed Research Organization at Begbroke
just outside Oxford, where she worked until its closure in 1985, attaining the position of deputy chief scientific officer, a senior position in the British Civil Service.
In 1985, Osborne retired from the Civil Service, and became a visiting professor at the Department of Plant Sciences of Oxford University, as well as an honorary research fellow of the Open University
and of Somerville College, Oxford
. In 1991, she moved to the Oxford Research Unit of the Open University at Foxcombe Hall, Boars Hill
, where she remained until her death in 2006. During her time at the Open University, she headed international research projects of the Royal Society
, and also attracted funding from Unilever
, the Wellcome Trust
and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
.
Osborne travelled widely during her career, holding short-term positions at Princeton
and the California Institute of Technology
in the USA, and visiting Argentina, Australia, India, Israel, Malaysia, Nigeria and South Africa. She also formed many international collaborations, latterly with scientists in China and Ukraine. In 1988, she organised a successful international NATO workshop in Turin
, Italy.
is a natural plant hormone
, rather than a by-product or pollutant, and for demonstrating that ethylene, rather than abscisic acid
, is the major regulator of senescence
(ageing) and abscission
(shedding of parts such as leaves). She conducted extensive research into interactions between ethylene and auxin
(another key plant hormone) in controlling numerous aspects of plant development. This work led her to develop the idea of the target cell as a model for how a small number of plant hormones can exert many different effects, a concept she expounded in her 2005 book, Hormones, Signals and Target Cells in Plant Development (co-authored with Michael McManus).
Another major focus of Osborne's research was seed
biology. An expert on seed ageing and plant DNA repair
, Osborne researched the effects of DNA degradation, repair and telomere
length on the viability of seeds. In the 1970s, she was among the earliest to attempt to isolate nucleic acid
s from ancient seeds, finding that only very short fragments could be isolated from grains from Egyptian tombs. Among her final research projects was a study of the effects on DNA repair in seeds and pollen
of exposure to radioactive fallout
after the Chernobyl nuclear reactor explosion
.
Osborne studied a huge diversity of plant species, from the aquatic liverwort
to the commercially important African oil palm
. Other topics of research within plant science included auxin
herbicide
s; dormancy
in potato
tuber
s; growth regulation in aquatic
and semi-aquatic plants; linking plant ultrastructure
with physiology and biochemistry
; and protein and RNA synthesis
in plants. She was active in the field of space biology
, designing a project for Spacelab
studying the role of gravity on development in grass
, and serving on the Royal Society
British National Committee on Space Research for a decade.
She also worked on the effects of plant hormones on insect
s, showing that sexual maturity
in desert locust
s is regulated by gibberellin
s, so that eating withered vegetation low in gibberellins might prevent the insects becoming sexually mature during the dry season
.
in the Ukraine in recognition of her research on the Chernobyl disaster, as well as an honorary research fellowship from Somerville College
, Oxford
. She received honorary doctorates from the UK's Open University
and from the University of Natal
, South Africa. She was awarded the Sircar Memorial Gold Medal for Research in Physiology of the University of Calcutta
in 1983. She was elected a corresponding member of the Botanical Society of America
in 1996. In January 2008, a commemorative issue of the journal Annals of Botany
was published in her honour.
Plant physiology
Plant physiology is a subdiscipline of botany concerned with the functioning, or physiology, of plants. Closely related fields include plant morphology , plant ecology , phytochemistry , cell biology, and molecular biology.Fundamental processes such as photosynthesis, respiration, plant nutrition,...
spanned five decades and resulted in over two hundred papers, twenty of which were published in Nature
Nature (journal)
Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...
. Her obituary in The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
described her scientific achievements as "legendary"; that from the Botanical Society of America
Botanical Society of America
The Botanical Society of America represents professional and amateur botanists, researchers, educators and students in over 80 countries of the world...
attributed her success to "her wonderful intellectual style, combined with her proclivity for remarkable and perceptive experimental findings".
Her research focused on plant hormone
Plant hormone
Plant hormones are chemicals that regulate plant growth, which, in the UK, are termed 'plant growth substances'. Plant hormones are signal molecules produced within the plant, and occur in extremely low concentrations. Hormones regulate cellular processes in targeted cells locally and, when moved...
s, seed
Seed
A seed is a small embryonic plant enclosed in a covering called the seed coat, usually with some stored food. It is the product of the ripened ovule of gymnosperm and angiosperm plants which occurs after fertilization and some growth within the mother plant...
biology and plant DNA repair
DNA repair
DNA repair refers to a collection of processes by which a cell identifies and corrects damage to the DNA molecules that encode its genome. In human cells, both normal metabolic activities and environmental factors such as UV light and radiation can cause DNA damage, resulting in as many as 1...
. She is best known for her work on the gas ethylene
Ethylene
Ethylene is a gaseous organic compound with the formula . It is the simplest alkene . Because it contains a carbon-carbon double bond, ethylene is classified as an unsaturated hydrocarbon. Ethylene is widely used in industry and is also a plant hormone...
, in particular for demonstrating that ethylene is a natural plant hormone
Plant hormone
Plant hormones are chemicals that regulate plant growth, which, in the UK, are termed 'plant growth substances'. Plant hormones are signal molecules produced within the plant, and occur in extremely low concentrations. Hormones regulate cellular processes in targeted cells locally and, when moved...
, and that it is the major regulator of ageing
Senescence
Senescence or biological aging is the change in the biology of an organism as it ages after its maturity. Such changes range from those affecting its cells and their function to those affecting the whole organism...
and the shedding
Abscission
Abscission is a term used in several areas of biology. In plant sciences it most commonly refers to the process by which a plant drops one or more of its parts, such as a leaf, fruit, flower or seed...
of leaves and fruits. She also originated the concept of the target cell as a model for understanding plant hormone action.
Education and career
Born in IndiaIndia
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, where her father was a colonial administrator, Osborne attended The Perse School
The Perse School
The Perse Upper School is an independent secondary co-educational day school in Cambridge, England. The school was founded in 1615 by Dr Stephen Perse, a Fellow of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and has existed on several different sites in the city before its present home on Hills...
in Cambridge
Cambridge
The city of Cambridge is a university town and the administrative centre of the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It lies in East Anglia about north of London. Cambridge is at the heart of the high-technology centre known as Silicon Fen – a play on Silicon Valley and the fens surrounding the...
. Her BSc in chemistry
Chemistry
Chemistry is the science of matter, especially its chemical reactions, but also its composition, structure and properties. Chemistry is concerned with atoms and their interactions with other atoms, and particularly with the properties of chemical bonds....
and MSc in botany
Botany
Botany, plant science, or plant biology is a branch of biology that involves the scientific study of plant life. Traditionally, botany also included the study of fungi, algae and viruses...
were from King's College London
King's College London
King's College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the federal University of London. King's has a claim to being the third oldest university in England, having been founded by King George IV and the Duke of Wellington in 1829, and...
. Her PhD on the topic of plant growth regulators was from the University of London
University of London
-20th century:Shortly after 6 Burlington Gardens was vacated, the University went through a period of rapid expansion. Bedford College, Royal Holloway and the London School of Economics all joined in 1900, Regent's Park College, which had affiliated in 1841 became an official divinity school of the...
at Wye College
Wye College
The College of St. Gregory and St. Martin at Wye, more commonly known as Wye College, was an educational institution in Kent, United Kingdom. It was founded in 1447 by John Kempe, the Archbishop of York, as a college for the training of priests. It is located in the small village of Wye, Kent, 60...
, Kent
Kent
Kent is a county in southeast England, and is one of the home counties. It borders East Sussex, Surrey and Greater London and has a defined boundary with Essex in the middle of the Thames Estuary. The ceremonial county boundaries of Kent include the shire county of Kent and the unitary borough of...
, where her supervisor was R. Louis Wain. Her first postgraduate position was in the Department of Biology of the California Institute of Technology
California Institute of Technology
The California Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Pasadena, California, United States. Caltech has six academic divisions with strong emphases on science and engineering...
, USA, as a Fulbright Scholar
Fulbright Program
The Fulbright Program, including the Fulbright-Hays Program, is a program of competitive, merit-based grants for international educational exchange for students, scholars, teachers, professionals, scientists and artists, founded by United States Senator J. William Fulbright in 1946. Under the...
, where she worked with botanist Fritz Went, among others.
Much of Osborne's career was spent at the Agricultural Research Council
Agricultural and Food Research Council
The Agricultural and Food Research Council , was a British Research Council responsible for funding and managing scientific and technological developments in farming and horticulture....
(ARC), later renamed the Agricultural and Food Research Council (AFRC). In 1952, she joined the ARC Unit of Experimental Agronomy at Oxford University, where she worked until the unit's closure in 1970. She then took up the position of deputy director at the new ARC Unit of Developmental Botany at the University of Cambridge
University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...
. During her time in Cambridge, she became the first female fellow of Churchill College
Churchill College, Cambridge
Churchill College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England.In 1958, a Trust was established with Sir Winston Churchill as its Chairman of Trustees, to build and endow a college for 60 fellows and 540 Students as a national and Commonwealth memorial to Winston Churchill; its...
and also supervised the college's first female PhD student. After the unit's closure in 1978, she joined the AFRC Weed Research Organization at Begbroke
Begbroke
Begbroke is a village and civil parish in Oxfordshire about west of Kidlington and northwest of Oxford.The toponym "Begbroke" is Old English for "Little Brook". This refers to Rowel Brook which runs through the village and was the reason for its early settlement...
just outside Oxford, where she worked until its closure in 1985, attaining the position of deputy chief scientific officer, a senior position in the British Civil Service.
In 1985, Osborne retired from the Civil Service, and became a visiting professor at the Department of Plant Sciences of Oxford University, as well as an honorary research fellow of the Open University
Open University
The Open University is a distance learning and research university founded by Royal Charter in the United Kingdom...
and of Somerville College, Oxford
Somerville College, Oxford
Somerville College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England, and was one of the first women's colleges to be founded there...
. In 1991, she moved to the Oxford Research Unit of the Open University at Foxcombe Hall, Boars Hill
Boars Hill
Boars Hill is a hill hamlet southwest of Oxford, straddling the boundariy between the civil parishes of Sunningwell and Wootton. It was part of Berkshire until the 1974 boundary changes transferred it to Oxfordshire.-History:...
, where she remained until her death in 2006. During her time at the Open University, she headed international research projects of the Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...
, and also attracted funding from Unilever
Unilever
Unilever is a British-Dutch multinational corporation that owns many of the world's consumer product brands in foods, beverages, cleaning agents and personal care products....
, the Wellcome Trust
Wellcome Trust
The Wellcome Trust was established in 1936 as an independent charity funding research to improve human and animal health. With an endowment of around £13.9 billion, it is the United Kingdom's largest non-governmental source of funds for biomedical research...
and the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council is a UK Research Council and NDPB and is the largest UK public funder of non-medical bioscience...
.
Osborne travelled widely during her career, holding short-term positions at Princeton
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
and the California Institute of Technology
California Institute of Technology
The California Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Pasadena, California, United States. Caltech has six academic divisions with strong emphases on science and engineering...
in the USA, and visiting Argentina, Australia, India, Israel, Malaysia, Nigeria and South Africa. She also formed many international collaborations, latterly with scientists in China and Ukraine. In 1988, she organised a successful international NATO workshop in Turin
Turin
Turin is a city and major business and cultural centre in northern Italy, capital of the Piedmont region, located mainly on the left bank of the Po River and surrounded by the Alpine arch. The population of the city proper is 909,193 while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat...
, Italy.
Research
The hormonal control of growth, differentiation and development in plants was Osborne's life-long interest. She is particularly known for her work establishing that the gas ethyleneEthylene
Ethylene is a gaseous organic compound with the formula . It is the simplest alkene . Because it contains a carbon-carbon double bond, ethylene is classified as an unsaturated hydrocarbon. Ethylene is widely used in industry and is also a plant hormone...
is a natural plant hormone
Plant hormone
Plant hormones are chemicals that regulate plant growth, which, in the UK, are termed 'plant growth substances'. Plant hormones are signal molecules produced within the plant, and occur in extremely low concentrations. Hormones regulate cellular processes in targeted cells locally and, when moved...
, rather than a by-product or pollutant, and for demonstrating that ethylene, rather than abscisic acid
Abscisic acid
Abscisic acid , also known as abscisin II and dormin, is a plant hormone. ABA functions in many plant developmental processes, including bud dormancy. It is degraded by the enzyme -abscisic acid 8'-hydroxylase.-Function:...
, is the major regulator of senescence
Senescence
Senescence or biological aging is the change in the biology of an organism as it ages after its maturity. Such changes range from those affecting its cells and their function to those affecting the whole organism...
(ageing) and abscission
Abscission
Abscission is a term used in several areas of biology. In plant sciences it most commonly refers to the process by which a plant drops one or more of its parts, such as a leaf, fruit, flower or seed...
(shedding of parts such as leaves). She conducted extensive research into interactions between ethylene and auxin
Auxin
Auxins are a class of plant hormones with some morphogen-like characteristics. Auxins have a cardinal role in coordination of many growth and behavioral processes in the plant's life cycle and are essential for plant body development. Auxins and their role in plant growth were first described by...
(another key plant hormone) in controlling numerous aspects of plant development. This work led her to develop the idea of the target cell as a model for how a small number of plant hormones can exert many different effects, a concept she expounded in her 2005 book, Hormones, Signals and Target Cells in Plant Development (co-authored with Michael McManus).
Seed
A seed is a small embryonic plant enclosed in a covering called the seed coat, usually with some stored food. It is the product of the ripened ovule of gymnosperm and angiosperm plants which occurs after fertilization and some growth within the mother plant...
biology. An expert on seed ageing and plant DNA repair
DNA repair
DNA repair refers to a collection of processes by which a cell identifies and corrects damage to the DNA molecules that encode its genome. In human cells, both normal metabolic activities and environmental factors such as UV light and radiation can cause DNA damage, resulting in as many as 1...
, Osborne researched the effects of DNA degradation, repair and telomere
Telomere
A telomere is a region of repetitive DNA sequences at the end of a chromosome, which protects the end of the chromosome from deterioration or from fusion with neighboring chromosomes. Its name is derived from the Greek nouns telos "end" and merοs "part"...
length on the viability of seeds. In the 1970s, she was among the earliest to attempt to isolate nucleic acid
Nucleic acid
Nucleic acids are biological molecules essential for life, and include DNA and RNA . Together with proteins, nucleic acids make up the most important macromolecules; each is found in abundance in all living things, where they function in encoding, transmitting and expressing genetic information...
s from ancient seeds, finding that only very short fragments could be isolated from grains from Egyptian tombs. Among her final research projects was a study of the effects on DNA repair in seeds and pollen
Pollen
Pollen is a fine to coarse powder containing the microgametophytes of seed plants, which produce the male gametes . Pollen grains have a hard coat that protects the sperm cells during the process of their movement from the stamens to the pistil of flowering plants or from the male cone to the...
of exposure to radioactive fallout
Nuclear fallout
Fallout is the residual radioactive material propelled into the upper atmosphere following a nuclear blast, so called because it "falls out" of the sky after the explosion and shock wave have passed. It commonly refers to the radioactive dust and ash created when a nuclear weapon explodes...
after the Chernobyl nuclear reactor explosion
Chernobyl disaster
The Chernobyl disaster was a nuclear accident that occurred on 26 April 1986 at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine , which was under the direct jurisdiction of the central authorities in Moscow...
.
Osborne studied a huge diversity of plant species, from the aquatic liverwort
Marchantiophyta
The Marchantiophyta are a division of bryophyte plants commonly referred to as hepatics or liverworts. Like other bryophytes, they have a gametophyte-dominant life cycle, in which cells of the plant carry only a single set of genetic information....
to the commercially important African oil palm
Oil palm
The oil palms comprise two species of the Arecaceae, or palm family. They are used in commercial agriculture in the production of palm oil. The African Oil Palm Elaeis guineensis is native to West Africa, occurring between Angola and Gambia, while the American Oil Palm Elaeis oleifera is native to...
. Other topics of research within plant science included auxin
Auxin
Auxins are a class of plant hormones with some morphogen-like characteristics. Auxins have a cardinal role in coordination of many growth and behavioral processes in the plant's life cycle and are essential for plant body development. Auxins and their role in plant growth were first described by...
herbicide
Herbicide
Herbicides, also commonly known as weedkillers, are pesticides used to kill unwanted plants. Selective herbicides kill specific targets while leaving the desired crop relatively unharmed. Some of these act by interfering with the growth of the weed and are often synthetic "imitations" of plant...
s; dormancy
Dormancy
Dormancy is a period in an organism's life cycle when growth, development, and physical activity are temporarily stopped. This minimizes metabolic activity and therefore helps an organism to conserve energy. Dormancy tends to be closely associated with environmental conditions...
in potato
Potato
The potato is a starchy, tuberous crop from the perennial Solanum tuberosum of the Solanaceae family . The word potato may refer to the plant itself as well as the edible tuber. In the region of the Andes, there are some other closely related cultivated potato species...
tuber
Tuber
Tubers are various types of modified plant structures that are enlarged to store nutrients. They are used by plants to survive the winter or dry months and provide energy and nutrients for regrowth during the next growing season and they are a means of asexual reproduction...
s; growth regulation in aquatic
Aquatic plant
Aquatic plants are plants that have adapted to living in aquatic environments. They are also referred to as hydrophytes or aquatic macrophytes. These plants require special adaptations for living submerged in water, or at the water's surface. Aquatic plants can only grow in water or in soil that is...
and semi-aquatic plants; linking plant ultrastructure
Ultrastructure
Ultrastructure is the detailed structure of a biological specimen, such as a cell, tissue, or organ, that can be observed by electron microscopy...
with physiology and biochemistry
Biochemistry
Biochemistry, sometimes called biological chemistry, is the study of chemical processes in living organisms, including, but not limited to, living matter. Biochemistry governs all living organisms and living processes...
; and protein and RNA synthesis
Transcription (genetics)
Transcription is the process of creating a complementary RNA copy of a sequence of DNA. Both RNA and DNA are nucleic acids, which use base pairs of nucleotides as a complementary language that can be converted back and forth from DNA to RNA by the action of the correct enzymes...
in plants. She was active in the field of space biology
Astrobiology
Astrobiology is the study of the origin, evolution, distribution, and future of life in the universe. This interdisciplinary field encompasses the search for habitable environments in our Solar System and habitable planets outside our Solar System, the search for evidence of prebiotic chemistry,...
, designing a project for Spacelab
Spacelab
Spacelab was a reusable laboratory used on certain spaceflights flown by the Space Shuttle. The laboratory consisted of multiple components, including a pressurized module, an unpressurized carrier and other related hardware housed in the Shuttle's cargo bay...
studying the role of gravity on development in grass
Grass
Grasses, or more technically graminoids, are monocotyledonous, usually herbaceous plants with narrow leaves growing from the base. They include the "true grasses", of the Poaceae family, as well as the sedges and the rushes . The true grasses include cereals, bamboo and the grasses of lawns ...
, and serving on the Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...
British National Committee on Space Research for a decade.
She also worked on the effects of plant hormones on insect
Insect
Insects are a class of living creatures within the arthropods that have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body , three pairs of jointed legs, compound eyes, and two antennae...
s, showing that sexual maturity
Sexual maturity
Sexual maturity is the age or stage when an organism can reproduce. It is sometimes considered synonymous with adulthood, though the two are distinct...
in desert locust
Desert locust
Plagues of the desert locust have threatened agricultural production in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia for centuries. The livelihood of at least one-tenth of the world’s human population can be affected by this voracious insect...
s is regulated by gibberellin
Gibberellin
Gibberellins are plant hormones that regulate growth and influence various developmental processes, including stem elongation, germination, dormancy, flowering, sex expression, enzyme induction, and leaf and fruit senescence....
s, so that eating withered vegetation low in gibberellins might prevent the insects becoming sexually mature during the dry season
Dry season
The dry season is a term commonly used when describing the weather in the tropics. The weather in the tropics is dominated by the tropical rain belt, which oscillates from the northern to the southern tropics over the course of the year...
.
Awards and honours
Osborne was awarded an honorary professorship at Kiev UniversityKiev University
Taras Shevchenko University or officially the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv , colloquially known in Ukrainian as KNU is located in Kiev, the capital of Ukraine. It is the third oldest university in Ukraine after the University of Lviv and Kharkiv University. Currently, its structure...
in the Ukraine in recognition of her research on the Chernobyl disaster, as well as an honorary research fellowship from Somerville College
Somerville College, Oxford
Somerville College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England, and was one of the first women's colleges to be founded there...
, Oxford
Oxford
The city of Oxford is the county town of Oxfordshire, England. The city, made prominent by its medieval university, has a population of just under 165,000, with 153,900 living within the district boundary. It lies about 50 miles north-west of London. The rivers Cherwell and Thames run through...
. She received honorary doctorates from the UK's Open University
Open University
The Open University is a distance learning and research university founded by Royal Charter in the United Kingdom...
and from the University of Natal
University of Natal
The University of Natal was a university in Natal, and later KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, that is now part of the University of KwaZulu-Natal. It was founded in 1910 as the Natal University College in Pietermaritzburg, and expanded to include a campus in Durban in 1931. In 1947, the university...
, South Africa. She was awarded the Sircar Memorial Gold Medal for Research in Physiology of the University of Calcutta
University of Calcutta
The University of Calcutta is a public university located in the city of Kolkata , India, founded on 24 January 1857...
in 1983. She was elected a corresponding member of the Botanical Society of America
Botanical Society of America
The Botanical Society of America represents professional and amateur botanists, researchers, educators and students in over 80 countries of the world...
in 1996. In January 2008, a commemorative issue of the journal Annals of Botany
Annals of Botany
Annals of Botany is a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal, founded in 1887, that publishes research articles, brief communications, and reviews in all areas of botany. The journal is supported and managed by Annals of Botany Company, a non-profit educational charity, and published through...
was published in her honour.
Books
- Osborne DJ, McManus MT. Hormones, Signals and Target Cells in Plant Development (Developmental and Cell Biology Series no. 41) (Cambridge University Press; 2005) (ISBN 0-521-33076-9)
Research papers
- Boubriak II, et al. (2008) Adaptation and impairment of DNA repair function in pollen of Betula verrucosa and seeds of Oenothera biennis from differently radionuclide-contaminated sites of Chernobyl. Annals of BotanyAnnals of BotanyAnnals of Botany is a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal, founded in 1887, that publishes research articles, brief communications, and reviews in all areas of botany. The journal is supported and managed by Annals of Botany Company, a non-profit educational charity, and published through...
101: 267–276 (pdf) - Osborne DJ. (1984) Concepts of target cells in plant differentiation. Cell Differentiation 14: 161–169
- Cheah KSE, Osborne DJ. (1978) DNA lesions occur with loss of viability in embryos of aging rye seed. NatureNature (journal)Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...
272: 593–599 (abstract) - Osborne DJ, Wright M. (1978) Gravity induced cell elongation. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London BProceedings of the Royal SocietyProceedings of the Royal Society is the parent title of two scientific journals published by the Royal Society, whereas its initial journal, Philosophical Transactions, is now devoted to special thematic issues...
199: 551–564 - Knee M, Sargent JA, Osborne DJ. (1977) Cell wall metabolism in developing strawberry fruits. Journal of Experimental Botany 28: 377–396 (abstract)
- Osborne DJ, Jackson MB, Milborrow BV. (1972) Physiological properties of an abscission accelerator from senescent leaves. Nature New Biology 240: 98–101
- Jackson MB, Osborne DJ. (1970) Ethylene, the natural regulator of leaf abscission. NatureNature (journal)Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...
225: 1019–1022 (abstract) - Ridge I, Osborne DJ. (1970) Hydroxyproline and peroxidases in cell walls of Pisum sativum: regulation by ethylene. Journal of Experimental Botany 21: 843–856 (abstract)
- Horton RF, Osborne DJ. (1967) Senescence, abscission and cellulase activity in Phaseolus vulgaris. NatureNature (journal)Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...
214: 1086–1088 (abstract) - Ellis PE, Carlisle DB, Osborne DJ. (1965) Desert locusts: sexual maturation delayed by feeding on senescent vegetation. ScienceScience (journal)Science is the academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is one of the world's top scientific journals....
149: 546–547 (abstract (with link to pdf)) - Fletcher RA, Osborne DJ. (1965) Regulation of protein and nucleic acid synthesis by gibberellin during leaf senescence. NatureNature (journal)Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...
207: 1176–1177 - Osborne DJ, Hallaway HM. (1964) The auxin, 2-4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid as a regulator of protein synthesis and senescence in detached leaves of Prunus. New Phytologist 63: 334–347
- Osborne DJ. (1962) Effect of kinetin on protein & nucleic acid metabolism in Xanthium leaves during senescence. Plant PhysiologyPlant physiologyPlant physiology is a subdiscipline of botany concerned with the functioning, or physiology, of plants. Closely related fields include plant morphology , plant ecology , phytochemistry , cell biology, and molecular biology.Fundamental processes such as photosynthesis, respiration, plant nutrition,...
37: 595–602 - Osborne DJ. (1955) Acceleration of abscission by factors in senescent leaves. NatureNature (journal)Nature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...
176: 1161–1163