Fulbright Scholar joins CSUB

Dr. Perez de Lis Castro is joining the CSUB biology team

By California State University, Bakersfield

February 19^th, 2020

With an ecosystem as diverse as California’s, the appeal of the Golden State for any biologist is not hard to understand. But it wasn’t just the mountains, beaches and deserts that drew Dr. Gonzalo Perez de Lis Castro here, it was CSU Bakersfield.

Part of the Fulbright Visiting Scholar Program, Dr. Perez de Lis Castro has joined the CSUB biology department to continue his research on the development of wood in trees. Originally from Spain, he will work closely with CSUB biology professor Dr. Anna Jacobsen, who also studies the production and function of wood.

“This is a very good opportunity to work on this team, to grow not only in a general point of view of being a better professional or better researcher, but also in learning new techniques,” Dr. Perez de Lis Castro said.

“This is really a good opportunity. I’m happy to be here.”

Dr. Perez de Lis Castro, 33, earned his PhD in Spain at the University of Santiago de Compostela and is continuing his studies in a post-doctoral research position in France at INRA Grand Est-Nancy (National Institute of Agricultural Research). He arrived in Bakersfield in December and will be here until October 2021, possibly taking on teaching duties in addition to his research.

CSUB biology professor Dr. Anna Jacobsen is hosting Dr. Perez de Lis Castro. Both study wood development in trees. Here, they are extracting a sample from a campus tree.

Dr. Jacobsen – who was a Fulbright Scholar herself in 2004, studying in South Africa – said hosting an international scholar like Dr. Perez de Lis Castro is significant for CSUB.

“This is fantastic for our students and our faculty,” Dr. Jacobsen said. “It’s always good when we have people coming from different backgrounds who can add to the intellectual richness of what we’re doing.”

In his time here, Dr. Perez de Lis Castro will work on a project titled, “Analyzing the Timing of Development and Functioning of the Vascular System of Ring-porous Species.” It will cover the relationship between the time it takes for newly formed wood cells to become mature and the time these cells can transport water. Dr. Jacobsen explained that wood is the water transport tissue, or vascular tissue, of the plant and controls how plants move water and how they respond to drought.

While the human eye can see wood growth in the rings trees form each year, Drs. Jacobsen and Perez de Lis Castro study it on a much smaller level. Cambium is a kind of stem cell tissue that grows new wood, Dr. Jacobsen said. Over winter, the cambium rests, creating a line in the wood, and as the weather gets warmer, conditions are more favorable for the cells to divide and produce new wood cells.

“What’s fascinating about plants is these cells grow and they develop and then they undergo programmed cell death, and only when they die are they functional for water transport,” Dr. Jacobsen said. “So, there’s this delay from when growth starts to when those cells are actually working the way they’re going to work in the plant.”

Dr. Perez de Lis Castro’s research has so far focused on formation of wood; with Dr. Jacobsen, he will expand into functionality as well, including the relationship between those two factors.

“For me, it’s a very good reference because they work on this relationship between structure and function in wood,” Dr. Perez de Lis Castro said. “It’s interesting this link between the formation of wood – so the time in which the wood is formed — and the time in which the wood is functional.”

The two also study the phenology of wood formation, or the patterns that are repeated seasonally. The phenology varies from species to species, and climate plays a role too. Using the growth, they can reconstruct past timelines and climates (dendrochronology and dendroclimatology, respectively).

Using a coring device, Drs. Jacobsen and Perez de Lis Castro are able to obtain a small sample of the tree to study its wood formation.

Back in the lab, Drs. Perez de Lis Castro and Jacobsen examine the sample on the cellular level.

Dr. Jacobsen is excited for CSUB students to have the chance to meet someone who, academically, is a few steps ahead of them.

“For our students, what’s fantastic is they get exposure to people who are at different academic levels than they normally would see,” she said of the Fulbright Scholar program. “To have post-docs here, it’s just giving students exposure to how the trajectory works as you go through an academic career.”

For his part, Dr. Perez de Lis Castro is most excited about the work he will be doing here, but getting to experience life in Bakersfield and check out California is a pretty great bonus. In addition to seeing the different environments the state has to offer, he also hopes to visit San Francisco and Los Angeles while he’s here.

“I only know a little tiny part of Bakersfield, but I like it,” he said. “It’s quite different, because here you can see the horizon. I’m used to living in cities where you have buildings around and you cannot see 100 or 200 meters away, and here you can see the plain area and then the mountains. It’s awesome.”