| Noni Franklin-Tong | |
| Birth Name: | Vernonica Elsa Tong |
| Birth Place: | London |
| Workplaces: | Umeå University University of Edinburgh |
| Alma Mater: | University of Birmingham |
| Thesis Title: | The genetics of self-incompatibility in Papaver rhoeas L. |
| Thesis Url: | https://birmingham-primo.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/f/vmc2c6/44BIR_ALMA_DS2183078590004871 |
| Thesis Year: | 1986 |
| Fields: | Self-incompatibility Signalling Cytoskeleton Programmed cell death |
Vernonica "Noni" Elsa Franklin-Tong is an English plant cell biologist who is Emeritus Professor at the University of Birmingham. She is known for her studies on self-incompatibility in Papaver rhoeas. In 2021 she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.[1]
Franklin-Tong was born in London.[2] She was an undergraduate student at the University of Birmingham, where she majored in biological sciences. She remained at Birmingham for her graduate studies, where she completed a PhD on the genetics of self-incompatibility in Papaver rhoeas in 1986.[3]
Franklin-Tong was awarded a Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) advanced fellowship. In 1997, she was appointed a lecturer at the University of Birmingham, and promoted to chair in 2004. Her research investigates the cellular mechanisms involved in the regulation of the cell-cell recognition system of self-incompatibility in Papaver rhoeas.[4] Self-incompatibility prevents inbreeding through the recognition and inhibition of a flower's own pollen, ultimately determining the reproductive success of flowering plants.[5]
Franklin-Tong developed an in vitro bioassay that allowed for the first investigations into the cell biology of self-incompatibility, unravelling the mechanisms that underpin the rejection of pollen that is not compatible. She identified an intricate intracellular signalling network that regulates this self-incompatibility and culminates in cell death.
The pollen S-determinant (PrpS) can be functionally expressed in Arabidopsis thaliana, a model plant that is self-compatibile.[6] When transgenic Arabidopsis thaliana pollen is exposed to recombinant Papaver rhoeas a similar response occurs to those detected in incompatible Papaver rhoeas pollen. This indicates that PrpS is a species with no self-incompatibility that diverged over one hundred million years ago.
Franklin-Tong was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2014.