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The Plant Science TREEAurora Levesley (University of Leeds, UK)

(University of Edinburgh). Furthermore, the Plant Science TREE supports over 2000 downloadable researchled lecture slides, images and practicals contributed by over 90 academics and publishers as well as engaging video clips, such as time lapse photography created by the BBC and other resources on topical plant science. Content is by no means exhaustive, but forms the foundation for each topic. Where a lecture slide is derived from a research paper it is linked to the original source for reference. Resources may be downloaded and used for educational purposes.

The TREE has been developed by the Gatsby Plant Science Summer School Project (www.gatsbyplants.leeds.ac.uk) that successfully conveys the excitement and potential of plant science to undergraduates through an annual summer school which has had a clear and lasting effect on the attitudes of students toward plant science, study choice and career aspirations1

The TREE builds on the strength of the UK Gatsby Plant Science Network and communication between its academic members. The success of the Plant Science TREE is owed to the community of contributors who are passionate about the future of plant science research and education. Key academics were selected to champion a plant science discipline, engage their colleagues and lead subject specific meetings covering metabolism, plant development, signalling, cells, lifecycles, reproduction, evolution, environment and biotic interactions. The subject meetings brought together researchactive academics who are also passionate about teaching, to share and review their lecture slides, select essential content and build a structure for their respective subjects. The innovative hierarchical TREE structure was thus created and forms an easy to use browsable framework for key content with the added advantage of the

The Plant Science TREE supports a wealth of researchled educational resources, including over 35 research lectures, filmed at the Gatsby Plant Science Summer Schools and developed into interactive online lectures that show the speaker, their slides and the capacity to select any part of a lecture. The online lectures are delivered by leading plant scientists about their research and deliberately pitched at a level to engage and enthuse undergraduate students. Recent lectures include ‘Engineering plant metabolism for healthy foods’ by Professor Cathie Martin (John Innes Centre) and ‘Plant science leads the way in understanding biological timekeeping’ by Professor Andrew Millar

The Plant Science TREE (Tool for Research Engaged Education) is an online teaching aid giving access to inspirational educational resources in the form of online lectures, lecture slides, movies, practicals and images from the research community, so that the excitement and potential for plant science can be disseminated to a wide student audience through educators worldwide.

The online lecture on ‘Engineering plant metabolism for healthy foods’ by Professor Cathie Martin, John Innes Centre and many other lectures may be viewed by registering with the Plant Science TREE at www.gatsbyplants.leeds.ac.uk/tree

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structure defining important areas in modern plant science. It is our experience that lecturers prefer to build their own custom-made lectures from individual slide content and the intuitive TREE structure allows them to do exactly that. Innovative web technologies, such as those inspired by mind mapping software, were implemented in the construction of the TREE to provide a smooth and extensive browsing experience either through ‘tree view’ or ‘map view’ as well as through a traditional search facility, all of which help the user find relevant content quickly and may even lead to a serendipitous find that is relevant to both teaching and research.

The TREE also offers the Plant News (www.gatsbyplants.leeds.ac.uk/news.php) with RSS feed and search facility, linking news articles, research articles, podcasts and videos of current developments and breakthroughs in plant science from leading journals and the media.

Usage has grown steadily since its launch and the TREE now supports over 1000 registered users

worldwide. Feedback suggests that the TREE has been very well received and is used by lecturers to develop modules, lectures and tutorials, as well as to enhance personal understanding and keep current in developments in plant science. Many lecturers refer their undergraduate students to the online lectures as supporting material for their course.

Lectures and lecture slides are freely available by registering at www.gatsbyplants.leeds.ac.uk/tree. ■

Plant science lecture slides, practicals and online lectures may be downloaded for educational use via the Plant Science TREE (www.gatsbyplants.leeds.ac.uk/tree).

Reference1. Levesley A., Jopson and S.J., Knight C.D. (2012) Plant Cell

24, 1306–1315

We welcome submissions of materials. If you would like to contribute your lecture slides, images or movies that you have created or simply sign up for a Plant News monthly email circular then please contact Aurora Levesley (a.levesley@leeds.ac.uk).