Welcome to Arkansas State University!

Professor of Metabolic Engineering

Vaughn Endowed Professorship; Director, A-State Phenomics Facility


Education

  • Ph.D. Biotechnology, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), Cuernavaca, Mexico
  • M.Sc. Biotechnology, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), Cuernavaca, Mexico
  • B.Sc. Biochemical Engineering, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Iztapalapa(UAM-I), Mexico

Teaching Specialties

  • Molecular Genetics and Genomics
  • Topics in Molecular Biosciences
  • Biochemistry
  • Biochemistry Laboratory
  • Chemistry Seminar

Research Interests

  • Plant metabolic engineering
  • Vitamin C metabolism
  • Plant stress tolerance
  • Plant high throughput phenotyping

Affiliations

  • American Association for the Advancement of Sciences (AAAS)
  • North American Plant Phenotyping Network (NAPPN)
  • North East Arkansas Hispanic Professional Network (NEAHPN)
  • Phytochemical Society of North America (PSNA)
  • Sigma Xi


Biography

Lorence grew up in Mexico, and joined ABI/A-State in 2005. She was at Virginia Tech before coming to Arkansas. Her life-long passion is biochemistry. Lorence was part of the team that in 2004 published the discovery of a new biosynthetic pathway for vitamin C in plants. At A-State Lorence leads a research team involved in understanding how plants make this essential vitamin using myo-inositol as the main building block. Her group also studies how vitamin C delays aging and contributes to confer plants tolerance to stresses. Her current model plants of study are: Arabidopsis, tobacco, tomato, and rice. Since 2011 she also leads the A-State Plant High Throughput Phenotyping Facility.