Liam Dolan One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where: is the Sherardian Professor of Botany in the Department of Biology at the

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the world's second-oldest university in contin ...

and a

Fellow A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

of Magdalen College, Oxford.

Education

Dolan was educated at

University College Dublin University College Dublin (commonly referred to as UCD) ( ga, Coláiste na hOllscoile, Baile Átha Cliath) is a public research university in Dublin, Ireland, and a collegiate university, member institution of the National University of Ireland ...

and the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universit ...

where he was awarded a PhD in 1991 for genetic analysis of leaf development in the cotton plant ''

Gossypium barbadense ''Gossypium barbadense'' (''gos-SIP-pee-um bar-ba-DEN-see'') is one of several species of cotton. It is in the mallow family. It has been cultivated since antiquity, but has been especially prized since a form with particularly long fibers was ...

'' supervised by Scott Poethig.

Career and research

Following his PhD, Dolan spent three years doing

postdoctoral research A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). The ultimate goal of a postdoctoral research position is to pu ...

at the John Innes Centre in

Norwich Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. Norwich is by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. As the seat of the Episcopal see, See of ...

. After 13 years as an independent project leader in Norwich, Dolan moved to

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the Un ...

as the Sherardian Professor of Botany in 2009. Dolan's research aims to define genetic mechanisms that control the development of plants and determine how these mechanisms have changed since plants colonised the land 500 million years ago. Dolan's research has been funded by the

Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), part of UK Research and Innovation, is a non-departmental public body (NDPB), and is the largest UK public funder of non-medical bioscience. It predominantly funds scientific res ...

(BBSRC) and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). Dolan has made outstanding contributions to our understanding of the development and

evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...

of land plant rooting systems. He was the first to define the precise cellular

body plan A body plan, ( ), or ground plan is a set of morphological features common to many members of a phylum of animals. The vertebrates share one body plan, while invertebrates have many. This term, usually applied to animals, envisages a "bluepri ...

of the ''

Arabidopsis ''Arabidopsis'' (rockcress) is a genus in the family Brassicaceae. They are small flowering plants related to cabbage and mustard. This genus is of great interest since it contains thale cress (''Arabidopsis thaliana''), one of the model org ...

'' root and discovered the molecular genetic mechanism governing root hair

cell differentiation Cellular differentiation is the process in which a stem cell alters from one type to a differentiated one. Usually, the cell changes to a more specialized type. Differentiation happens multiple times during the development of a multicellula ...

. He demonstrated that this mechanism is ancient and was the first to discover the mechanism that controlled the development of the earliest land plant rooting systems that caused dramatic climate change over 400 million years ago. These pivotal discoveries illuminate our understanding of the interrelationships between the development of plants, their evolution and the

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surf ...

System. With

Alison Mary Smith Alison Mary Smith (born 1954) is a British biologist. She is Strategic Programme Leader at the John Innes Centre in Norwich and an Honorary Professor at the University of East Anglia (UEA) in the UK. Education Smith was educated at the Univer ...

, George Coupland,

Nicholas Harberd Nicholas Paul Harberd (born 15 July 1956) is Sibthorpian Professor of Plant Science and former head of the Department of Plant Sciences (since 2022 part of the Department of Biology) at the University of Oxford, and Fellow of St John's Coll ...

Jonathan D. G. Jones Jonathan Dallas George Jones (born 14 July 1954) is a senior scientist at the Sainsbury Laboratory and a professor at the University of East Anglia using molecular and genetic approaches to study disease resistance in plants. Education Jones ...

Cathie Martin Catherine Rosemary Martin (born April 1955) is a Professor of Plant Sciences at the University of East Anglia and project leader at the John Innes Centre, Norwich, co-ordinating research into the relationship between diet and health and how cro ...

, Robert Sablowski and Abigail Amey he is a co-author of the textbook ''Plant Biology''.

Awards and honours

Dolan was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2014. Dolan was elected a member of the

European Molecular Biology Organization The European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) is a professional, non-profit organization of more than 1,800 life scientists. Its goal is to promote research in life science and enable international exchange between scientists. It co-funds cour ...

(EMBO) in 2009, and was awarded the President's Medal of the Society for Experimental Biology (SEB) in 2001.

References

Fellows of the Royal Society Living people Members of the European Molecular Biology Organization Sherardian Professors of Botany Fellows of Magdalen College, Oxford Alumni of University College Dublin University of Pennsylvania alumni Year of birth missing (living people) {{UK-scientist-stub