Joanne Chory facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Joanne Chory
Chory at Salk in 2022
Born	March 19, 1955 Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Died	November 12, 2024 (aged 69) La Jolla, California, U.S.
Nationality	American
Alma mater	Oberlin College (BS, Biology) University of Illinois,Urbana–Champaign (PhD, Microbiology)
Known for	Plant hormone biology, retrograde signaling, photobiology
Awards	Genetics Society of America Medal (2012) Kumho Award in Plant Molecular Biology (2004) Scientific American 50: Research Leader in Agriculture (2003) L'Oreal-UNESCO Award for Women in Science (2000) American Society of Plant Biologists, Charles Albert Schull Award (1995) Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences (2018) Gruber Prize in Genetics (2018) Princess of Asturias Award (2019) Benjamin Franklin Medal (2024) Wolf Prize in Agriculture (2024)
Scientific career
Fields	Plant Biology
Institutions	Salk Institute for Biological Studies
Doctoral advisor	Samuel Kaplan

Joanne Chory (born March 19, 1955 – died November 12, 2024) was an amazing American scientist. She was a plant biologist and geneticist. This means she studied plants and their genes.

Chory worked as a professor at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies. She led the Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology Laboratory there. She was also a researcher for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

One of her biggest projects was the Salk Institute’s Harnessing Plants Initiative (HPI). This project uses plants to help fight climate change. The idea is to make plants better at capturing and storing carbon dioxide. This gas contributes to global warming. Chory and her team wanted plants to grow bigger, stronger roots. These roots could then bury more carbon in the ground. They aimed to do this using a natural substance called suberin.

Many people thought Chory was the most important plant biologist of her time. Her work for over 30 years changed how we study plants. She used molecular genetics to understand how plants change their shape and size. This helps them grow best in different environments. It also helps them perform photosynthesis well.

Chory received many important awards for her work. In 2011, she became a Foreign Member of the Royal Society. She also won the 2018 Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences. In 2019, she received the Prince of Asturias Award. Her HPI team also got big awards. They received $35 million from the TED Audacious Project in 2019. Then, they got another $30 million from the Bezos Earth Fund in 2020.

About Joanne Chory

Joanne Chory was born in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1955. She grew up with four brothers and one sister. Her parents were from Lebanon.

She went to Oberlin College in Ohio. There, she earned a degree in biology with honors. After that, she continued her studies at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. She received her Ph.D. from this university.

After her Ph.D., she worked at Harvard Medical School. In 1988, she joined the Salk Institute. She started there as an Assistant Professor. Joanne Chory married Stephen Worland. They adopted two children together.

In 2004, Chory was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. This is a disease that can affect movement. Even with this health challenge, she kept doing her important genetic research. She used medications and even had a brain implant to help her. Chory also wanted to inspire young women to become scientists. She worked hard to make the science field better for women.

Joanne Chory was not always interested in genetics. At first, she focused on microbiology. But through her research, she became very interested in genetics. She was especially interested in studies on Arabidopsis plants. Throughout her long career, she won many awards for her contributions.

Chory passed away in La Jolla, California, on November 12, 2024. She was 69 years old.

Her Research and Discoveries

Joanne Chory's main research goal was to find ways to make plants grow better. This was to help feed the world's growing population. She used a small plant called Arabidopsis thaliana for her studies. This plant is often used as a model organism in science. Her aim was to improve all plants, not just Arabidopsis.

She would change the genes of the Arabidopsis plant. Then, she would study what happened because of these changes. She used many different methods to understand her results. These included genetics, genomics, cell biology, and biochemistry.

Chory made big steps in understanding how plants react to light. She also learned a lot about plant hormones. She used this knowledge to help other plants grow better. Her hope was to help us feed more people around the world.

Chory loved to see how changing an organism's features (its phenotypes) affected it. Light signals are very important for how plants grow and develop. She studied how plants change when they are exposed to different light. Her work found special genes that affect how seedlings grow in light. She also discovered that certain hormones control how seedlings develop in light.

Her lab also worked on how plant steroids affect growth. They found ways to change these steroids. This changed how plants grew and developed. Her team also helped us understand how different parts of a plant "talk" to each other. This includes how chloroplasts (where photosynthesis happens) send signals to the plant's nucleus. They also studied how plants avoid shade.

Awards and Honors

See also

In Spanish: Joanne Chory para niños