Charlie’s research lies at the interface of plant genetics, epigenetics, and reproduction biology. He is interested in how plant meiosis and reproduction have been molded and modified over evolutionary time, and the impact this can have on plant genome structure and integrity. His PhD was focused on understanding how meiotic recombination rate is controlled in plant genomes. Meiotic recombination rate was long known to be suppressed in repetitive regions of plant genomes. In Arabidopsis, he showed that repressive epigenetic pathways (specifically H3K9me2 and non-CG DNA methylation) play a role in this suppression. He has also worked on natural accessions of Arabidopsis for the mapping and cloning of a trans-modifier of meiotic recombination rate, HEI10. Interestingly, overexpression of HEI10 led to genome-wide increases in crossover rate suggesting it is a limiting factor in crossover formation in plants. He is currently working on Apomixis (asexual reproduction through seeds), which occurs naturally in the common dandelion. At KeyGene, he also collaborates with crop scientists and breeders on plant reproduction and genomics projects.
