Ben Koch

I am interested in how plants and pathogens exchange RNA with one another. One such RNA exchange produces the phenomenon known as host-induced gene silencing, in which short regulatory RNA in the host plant target transcripts in the pathogen. In my research, I am working to more fully understand the mechanism by which RNA and RNA-binding proteins move from the plant to the pathogen to accomplish host-induced gene silencing.

I am interested in super-resolution microscopy to directly observe the exchange of specific RNAs between plants and pathogens, and biochemical techniques to characterize the extracellular particles that contain RNA. During my PhD, I studied how plant extracellular vesicles are involved in immunity.