Anne L. Plant is an American biochemist. She is a Fellow at the
National Institute of Standards and Technology
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is an agency of the United States Department of Commerce whose mission is to promote American innovation and industrial competitiveness. NIST's activities are organized into Outline of p ...
where she was previously chief of the biosystems and biomaterials division. Plant investigates measurements and models of cell populations. She is a recipient of the
United States Department of Commerce
The United States Department of Commerce (DOC) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government. It is responsible for gathering data for business and governmental decision making, establishing industrial standards, catalyzing econ ...
's
Bronze
Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper, commonly with about 12–12.5% tin and often with the addition of other metals (including aluminium, manganese, nickel, or zinc) and sometimes non-metals (such as phosphorus) or metalloid ...
and
Silver Medals. Plant is a fellow of the
American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering and the
American Association for the Advancement of Science
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is a United States–based international nonprofit with the stated mission of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific responsib ...
.
Education
Plant completed a B.A. with university scholarship honors in biology with minors in math and chemistry in 1976 at
University of Arizona
The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona, United States. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it ...
. In 1978, she earned a M.S. in human nutrition from
University of Nebraska–Lincoln
The University of Nebraska–Lincoln (Nebraska, NU, or UNL) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Lincoln, Nebraska, United States. Chartered in 1869 by the Nebraska Legislature as part of the M ...
under advisor
Constance Kies. Her thesis was titled, ''The effect of copper and fiber supplementation on copper utilization in humans''. Plant earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry from
Baylor College of Medicine
The Baylor College of Medicine (BCM) is a private medical school in Houston, Texas, United States. Originally as the Baylor University College of Medicine from 1903 to 1969, the college became independent with the current name and has been se ...
in 1983. Her doctoral advisor was
Louis C. Smith. Plant's dissertation was titled ''Aqueous phase transfer of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons in model membranes and cells''.
Career and research
From 1986 to 1995, Plant was a research chemist at
National Institute of Standards and Technology
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is an agency of the United States Department of Commerce whose mission is to promote American innovation and industrial competitiveness. NIST's activities are organized into Outline of p ...
(NIST) where she served as project leader of the biosensors multidisciplinary group. During this time, she also was a visiting scientist at the . She was on the research advisory committee for the director of NIST from 1993 to 1996, serving its chairperson for the 1995 to 1996 term. Plant was the scientific advisor to the director of the NIST chemical science and technology laboratory from 1994 to 1995. From 1995 to 2001, Plant was group leader of the biomolecular materials group awhere she coordinated and directed research efforts with a budget of approximately $2 million. She served as a visiting scientist at
Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research. She was a visiting scholar in the biology department at
Johns Hopkins University
The Johns Hopkins University (often abbreviated as Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. Founded in 1876 based on the European research institution model, J ...
from 2000 to 2001 where she researched the effect of extracellular matrix on cell shape and gene expression with
Michael Edidin. Plant was the NIST representative to the
National Science and Technology Council from 2004 to 2005. She was group leader of the cell systems science group in the biochemical science division at NIST from 2001 to 2012. From 2012 to 2017, she was chief of the biosystems and biomaterials division at NIST where she explores improving measurement assurance for complex biological systems. Her division comprised approximately 80 staff and associates with a budget of $16 million. , Plant is a NIST Fellow where she researches measurements and models of cell populations.
Plant's branch researches single-cell measurements from live cell microscopy, and development of theoretical approaches that lead to predictive understanding of complex cellular systems. Currently, Plant examines small molecular networks in engineered induced pluripotent stem cells with a statistical thermodynamics model. The heterogeneity of cellular phenotypes within isogenic populations provides a window into the diversity of ways the cellular machinery can operate to process information. This diversity of expression reflects the stochastic fluctuations that occur as connected network variables interact with one another to effect up- and down-regulation. Plant's lab goals include to measure the kinetic constants for those fluctuations, and the correlations between them, to provide a thermodynamic basis for understanding which cellular measurands are the most important for controlling a particular phenotype. This work is motivated by a critical challenge in characterizing cell-based therapies, namely what should be measured that will provide predictive information about the cell product to assure desirable functionality. Carrying out this study involves a large number of NIST collaborators to address challenges in rapid non-perturbing quantitative imaging, CRISPR-Cas genome editing of reporter iPSC lines, image analysis including the use of CNN inference, and theoretical modeling.
Awards and honors
In 1991 and 2011, Plant received the
Department of Commerce Bronze Medal. She was awarded the
Department of Commerce Silver Medal in 2007. Plant was elected fellow of the
American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering in 2013. She became a
in 2016.
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Plant, Anne
Living people
Year of birth missing (living people)
Place of birth missing (living people)
University of Arizona alumni
University of Nebraska–Lincoln alumni
Baylor College of Medicine alumni
20th-century American biologists
21st-century American biologists
20th-century American women scientists
21st-century American women scientists
American women biochemists
National Institute of Standards and Technology people
21st-century American chemists
20th-century American chemists