Núria Sánchez Coll

Department

Bacterial Plant Diseases and Cell Death

Job Title

Group Leader & CSIC Researcher

INSTRUCTION LANGUAGES

English

PERSONAL BIO

Nuria Sanchez Coll is a CSIC Scientist and Group Leader of the Bacterial Plant Diseases and Cell Death group at the Centre for Research in Agricultural Genomics (CRAG). Her research focuses on plant immunity, proteases, and cell death, with major contributions published in Science, Nature, PNAS, and The Plant Cell. With an H-index of 30 and more than 9,700 citations (WOS), she is listed among Stanford’s Top 2% scientists. Dr. Sanchez Coll has authored 69 SCI papers (90% in Q1 journals, 70% in D1) and six book chapters, advancing the understanding of both conventional and unconventional plant immune responses in model and crop systems.

Her career includes prestigious fellowships such as Marie Curie, Beatriu de Pinós, and Fulbright, along with over a decade of international research experience at ETH Zurich, Duke University, and the University of North Carolina. At CRAG, she coordinates the Stress Program, serves on both the Scientific and Biosafety Committees, and oversees the P2+ Laboratory. Her work is consistently supported by competitive national and international grants and complemented by active collaborations, two patents, and contracts with biotech companies.

She serves as an Editor for the Journal of Experimental Botany and reviews for more than 30 journals and multiple funding agencies, including ERC and ANR. Dr. Sanchez Coll has supervised 16 PhD students and 9 postdoctoral researchers, many of whom now hold academic or industry positions. Recognized for her teaching at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, she also contributes widely to outreach and science communication initiatives.

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WORK EXPERIENCE AND AWARDS

CRAG, Spain (2020–Present)
- CSIC Scientist
- Group Leader (2016–Present)
- Ramon y Cajal Researcher (2016–2020)
- Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellow (2014–2016)
- Beatriu de Pinós Postdoctoral Fellow (2012–2014)
Fulbright Scholar, Duke University / University of North Carolina, USA (2024–2024)
Senior Research Associate, University of North Carolina, USA (2011–2012)
Postdoctoral Researcher, University of North Carolina, USA (2006–2010)

EDUCATIONAL BACKGROUND

PhD in Sciences, ETH-Zürich, Switzerland
Master in Communication, Open University of Catalonia, Spain
Master in Experimental Sciences, University of Barcelona, Spain
Bachelor in Biology, University of Barcelona, Spain

VacancIES

Brief Introduction of the Department

The Center for Research in Agricultural Genomics (CRAG) is an independent organization established as a consortium of four major research institutions: the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), the Institute for Food and Agricultural Research and Technology (IRTA), the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), and the University of Barcelona (UB). This innovative partnership brings together diverse research groups working on plants and farm animals, providing a unique environment for research and training focused on the genetic and genomic determinants shared across species.

CRAG is dedicated to cutting-edge research on the molecular basis of traits of agricultural relevance, as well as the application of molecular approaches to the improvement of plant and animal species important for food production. Its research spans from fundamental biology to applied studies conducted in close collaboration with industry.

The Center is organized into four Scientific Programs: Plant Development and Signal Transduction, Plant Responses to Stress, Plant Synthetic Biology and Metabolic Engineering, and Plant and Animal Genomics. These programs are supported by several state-of-the-art technological platforms, which are also open to the wider scientific community.

CRAG is committed to translating research outcomes into societal benefit and to training the next generation of plant and animal scientists who will help address the major agricultural and global challenges of the twenty-first century.

Department Staff Number

More than 10 people

Internship Job Description

A major unresolved question in plant immunity is how the early signaling events triggered by immune receptor activation or pathogen recognition lead to the execution of cell death, and how this process contributes to systemic acquired immunity in surrounding tissues. The spatiotemporal regulation of cell death is of central importance, yet many gaps remain before we can design strategies to harness programmed cell death as a tool for controlling invading pathogens.

Recently, we developed a spatiotemporally resolved gene-expression analysis in Arabidopsis that identified a distinctive and time-dependent set of differentially expressed genes in tissues undergoing immune-related cell death compared with their surrounding cells. This project focuses on characterizing one of the most important yet unstudied markers of this process: a predicted AAA+-ATPase. We have already generated a comprehensive set of molecular tools for this gene, including loss-of-function mutants, overexpression lines, and reporter constructs.

In this project, knock-out mutants and overexpression lines will be quantitatively assessed for their capacity to initiate immune-related cell death and to restrict the growth of the bacterial pathogen Pseudomonas syringae. We will also examine the protein’s localization dynamics during immune activation and cell death using confocal microscopy and molecular simulations.

Together, these studies will provide mechanistic insight into the role of this AAA+-ATPase in immune-mediated cell death and its potential as a target for engineering disease resistance.