Carl Procko

Areas of Interest

The Procko lab is interested in how plants sense, respond and adapt to their environment.  Being photosynthetic, plants are particularly tuned to their local light environment, which affects nearly every aspect of plant growth.  Changes in light intensity can alter leaf cell morphology, chloroplast positioning, pigment production, and/or leaf shape.  For some plants, canopy shading will also induce stem growth in an effort to outgrow competitors.  This growth occurs at the expense of pest and pathogen resistance.  Using genetic approaches, the Procko lab works to improve our understanding of these responses to light at the molecular level.

In addition, the Procko lab studies plant glands, which are important for environment interactions.  Glandular hairs on leaves and stems can produce toxins that protect the plant from pathogens and insect herbivores, while the glands of some mangrove trees secrete salt as a mechanism to facilitate growth in high salinity soils.  Other spectacular examples of highly specialized glands can be found within carnivorous plants, which have evolved to attract, sense, catch and digest animal prey.  The Procko lab studies the glands of one such carnivore—the sundew plant—as an extreme model system.  Glands on the sundew leaf secrete large droplets of a sticky glue to capture small animals, as well as digestive enzymes for the acquisition of prey nutrients.  The study of these glands will improve our understanding of the genes that regulate plant gland development and function, and how glands have evolved over time.

Selected Publications

• Swift J, Wu X, Xu J, Procko C, Jain T, Illouz-Eliaz N, Nery JR, Chory J, and Ecker JR. Stress drives plasticity in leaf aging transcriptional dynamics in Arabidopsis thaliana. 2026. Nature Plants 12: 780–790.
• Anfang M, Yaakov SB, Su N, Shafir A, Binenbaum J, Yahya RH, Yu X, Procko C, Bar H, Chory J, Schroeder J, Fichman Y, Mayrose I, Shani E, and Zhang Y. 2025. mTACT: A cell type-specific transportome-scale amiRNA toolbox to overcome functional redundancy in Arabidopsis. Plant Physiology. doi: 10.1093/plphys/kiaf682.
• Procko C, Chory J. 2024. Carnivorous plant evolution: is a killer defense always the best option? J Exp Bot. 75(1):9-12. PMCID: PMC10735428.
• Procko C, Wong WM, Patel J, Mousavi SAR, Dabi T, Duque M, Baird L, Chalasani SH, and Chory J. 2023. Mutational analysis of mechanosensitive ion channels in the carnivorous Venus flytrap plant. Curr. Biol. doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2023.06.048.
• Yaaran A, Erez E, Procko C, and Moshelion M. 2023. Leaf hydraulic maze: Abscisic acid effects on bundle-sheath, palisade, and spongy mesophyll conductance. Plant Physiol. doi: 10.1093/plphys/kiad372.
• Procko C*, Radin I*, Hou C, Richardson RA, Haswell ES, and Chory J. 2022. Dynamic calcium signals mediate the feeding response of the carnivorous sundew plant. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 119(30): e2206433119. doi: 10.1073/pnas.
  (*) Co-first authors.
• Procko C, Lee T, Borsuk A, Bargmann BOR, Dabi T, Nery JR, Estelle M, Baird L, O’Connor C, Brodersen C, Ecker JR, and Chory J, 2022. Leaf cell-specific and single-cell transcriptional profiling reveals a role for the palisade layer in UV light protection. The Plant Cell. doi: 10.1093/plcell/koac167.
• Procko C*, Murthy SE*, Keenan WT*, Mousavi SAR, Dabi T, Coombs A, Procko E, Baird L, Patapoutian A**, and Chory J**. 2021. Stretch-activated ion channels identified in the touch-sensitive structures of carnivorous Droseraceae plants. eLife. doi: 10.7554/eLife.64250.
  (*) Co-first authors.
  (**) Co-corresponding authors.
• Procko C, Burko Y, Jaillais Y, Ljung K, Long JA, and Chory J. 2016. The epidermis coordinates auxin-induced stem growth in response to shade. Genes & Development. 30: 1529-1541. PMCID: PMC4949326.
• Procko C, Crenshaw CM, Ljung K, Noel JP, and Chory J. 2014. Cotyledon-Generated Auxin Is Required for Shade-Induced Hypocotyl Growth in Brassica rapa. Plant Physiology. 165(3): 1285-1301. PMCID: PMC4081337.