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Dr Meredith Wilkes

Summary

I'm interested in how proteins contribute to the quality and function of cereal foods. I want to know what proteins are associated with food quality and how processing and storage can maintain or improve the function of proteins in foods.

Research interests

I am leading a research group that uses proteomic analyses to investigate the role of protein in grain quality. Two major areas of investigation are storage temperature and the role of genotype and environment interactions on wheat grain quality. The identification of key proteins that change during wheat grain storage at elevated temperatures explains why flour made from grains stored at higher than optimal temperatures exhibit poor baking qualities. The major outcomes are i) a demonstrated need for grain to be stored under optimal conditions to preserve protein quality, and ii) a deeper understanding of how protein solubility is related to dough quality. The findings form the groundwork for research that will enable mechanisms of glutenin solubilisation to be determined and that will enable industry to balance the costs and benefits of storage temperature control.

More recently we have been working collaboratively with the Plant Breeding Institute at the University investigating the role of genotype and environment interactions on wheat grain quality. This is a major study that will correlate tillage practices and soil types with wheat genotypes and their grain quality in Australia.

Background

Meredith has been involved with the study of biochemistry for over 15 years. Meredith completed undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in Agricultural Chemistry and has been a Lecturer in Food Chemistry in the Faculty of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources for five years. In that time Meredith has taught in Chemistry and Biochemistry of Foods and Plant Biochemistry and Molecular Biology units of study.

Prior to being appointed in this position Meredith gained extensive biochemistry skills in research positions held both at the University and at Australia’s largest research-only organisation, the CSIRO. Meredith has conducted and supervised research in a range of areas including wheat and malt biochemistry, starch synthesis in rice, glucose metabolism associated with diabetes and the molecular biology of mineral leaching microorganisms.

Recent publications

  • Wilkes MA and Copeland L. 2008. Storage of wheat grains at elevated temperatures increases solubilization of glutenin subunits. Cereal Chemistry. 85(3): 335–38.
  • Wilkes MA, Marshall DR and Copeland L. 1999. Hydroxamic acids in cereal roots inhibit the growth of take-all. Soil Biology and Biochemistry. 31: 1831-36.
  • Nguyen G, Hailstones D, Wilkes M and Sutton B. Water deficit induced pollen sterility associated with a programmed cell death and oxidative stress in rice anthers (PP-RICE-050). 2nd International Conference on Rice for the Future, BioAsia 2007, Thailand, 7–9 November. Page 202-09.
  • Eziah VY, Rose HA, Wilkes MA, Clift AD and Mansfield S. Biochemical mechanisms of insecticide resistance in field populations of the diamondback moth, (DBM) Plutella xylostella (L.) (Lepidoptera: Yponomeutidae) in the Sydney region, New South Wales. Australian and New Zealand Entomological Societies Conference, September 2006.
  • Hendry P, Wilkes MA and Liu C-Q. Cloning and expression of thiocyanate genes in iron/sulphur oxidising bacteria. Green Processing, International Conference on the Sustainable Processing of Minerals. Cairns, 2002.
  • Liu C-Q, Wilkes MA and Hendry P. Genetic analysis of thiocyanate resistance in a Microbacterium spp. bacterium isolated from a mining environment. Australian Society for Microbiology, Annual Scientific Meeting. Perth, 2001.
  • Patiag D, Qu X, Gray S, Idris I, Wilkes M, Seale JP and Donnelly R. 2000. Possible interactions between angiotensin II and insulin: effects on glucose and lipid metabolism in vivo and in vitro. Journal of Endocrinology. 167: 525-31.
  • Patiag D, Qu X, Wilkes M, Gray S, Seale JP and Donnelly R. Effects of Angiotensin II and AT1 and AT2 receptor blockade on glucose and lipid metabolism in vivo and in vitro. In Diabetologia. 1999. 42:A189. 35th Annual Meeting of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes. Brussels.

Contact

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