Staff Members
Prof. dr. Jian Xu
Victoria Mironova
Prof. dr. Jian Xu
Chair of Plant Systems Physiology
Jian's research interest lies primarily in the procecess of cell development and adaptation. In recent years, he has embraced single cell technology to study individual cells at unprecedented resolution.
Ivo Rieu
Victoria Mironova
Prof. dr. Jian Xu
Associate Professor
Ivo studies how plants protect themselves against environmental changes, in particular regarding the effect of heatwaves on reproduction. He is dedicated to sustainable, climate-proof agriculture and food security.
Victoria Mironova
Victoria Mironova
Victoria Mironova
Associate Professor
Victoria's research is focused on the mathematical modeling of plant development and computational inference of cis-regulatory modules. She has developed novel bioinformatics and systems biology approaches to understand developmental processes.
Janny Peters
Victoria Mironova
Victoria Mironova
Assistant Professor
The use of synthetic pesticides helps to maintain crop yields, but their use has detrimental effects on ecosystems and human health. Janny is currently investigating the possibilities of using essential oils as green pesticides for sustainable agriculture.
Daan van den Brink
Jeroen van den Hurk
Daan van den Brink
Researcher
Daan is an imaging specialist who is particularly interested in visualizing and quantifying cellular and subcellular dynamics using the latest techniques in microscopy. He looks to combine live cell imaging with other techniques we use, such as single-cell multi-omics and computational modelling.
Elvira Spoelman
Jeroen van den Hurk
Daan van den Brink
Secretary
Elvira...
Jeroen van den Hurk
Jeroen van den Hurk
Jeroen van den Hurk
Technician
Jeoren...
Postdocs
Maritza van Dop
Maritza van Dop
Maritza van Dop
Veni Postdoc
It is important for plant development that some cells let go of the plant. The plant ensures that the correct connections between cells are broken, otherwise the plant would fall apart. Maritza investigates how a plant cell determines which connections should be broken, and how this cell release happens.
Rahul Shaw
Maritza van Dop
Maritza van Dop
Postdoc
Rahul is interested in exploring the working principle of biological systems with bioinformatics and computational systems biological approaches. Where, he focuses on both reductionist and holistic view of the system. He uses and develops single-cell analytics solutions to identify novel information from single cells.
Xin Tian (Eric)
Maritza van Dop
Kavya Durgaprasad
Postdoc
Eric is particularly fascinated by how a cell manages to escape its pre-defined cell lineage and adopt a completely new identity during regeneration. He employs high-resolution live imaging and single-cell RNA sequencing techniques to decode the cellular and molecular dynamics at single-cell resolution, and re-construct the developmental trajectory of each cell within a regenerating tissue.
Kavya Durgaprasad
Kavya Durgaprasad
Kavya Durgaprasad
REI Postdoc
Kavya is intrigued by the amazing ability of plant roots to regenerate their entire tip, including stem cells, post damage. She is exploiting her expertise in regeneration-related techniques and exploring an elusive area in the field of plant regeneration which is ''epigenetic regulation of root tip regeneration by histone deacetylases (HDACs)''.
Maria Savina
Kavya Durgaprasad
Maria Savina
REI Postdoc
Maria is a computational biologist interested in the genetic mechanisms of plant morphogenesis. She is working to develop a multiscale digital model of auxin distribution in the plant root.
PhD Students
Martijn Jansen
Ruben De Francesco
Martijn Jansen
PhD Student
Martijn...
Max Frencken
Ruben De Francesco
Martijn Jansen
PhD Student
Max...
Yana Sizentsova
Ruben De Francesco
Ruben De Francesco
PhD Student
Yana is a bioinformatician interested in developing integrative methods for complex biological trait analysis. Her current project is to find candidate genes responsible for cold stress survival in plants by meta-analysis of transcriptome data and transcription factor DNA-binding assay.
Ruben De Francesco
Ruben De Francesco
Ruben De Francesco
PhD Student
Ruben...
Elmar van der Wijk
Elmar van der Wijk
Elmar van der Wijk
PhD Student
Elmar aims to unravel the cellular and molecular mechanisms of gene regulation and acclimation. He is interested in how these mechanisms take part in adaptation to the local climate, at the level of a species, or populations within one. His project is a cooperation with Plant Stress Resilience at Utrecht University and strives
PhD Student
Elmar aims to unravel the cellular and molecular mechanisms of gene regulation and acclimation. He is interested in how these mechanisms take part in adaptation to the local climate, at the level of a species, or populations within one. His project is a cooperation with Plant Stress Resilience at Utrecht University and strives to elucidate mechanisms of how the hormone ethylene protects the root meristem against low-oxygen stress during flooding.
Gaigai Du
Elmar van der Wijk
Elmar van der Wijk
PhD Student
Gaigai is interested in how plant root growth responds to long-term mild heat (LTMH) stress. She uses microscopy techniques for root phenotyping and RNA sequencing analysis to explore the mechanisms underlying root morphological changes to LTMH stress.
Klaske Kuipers
Elmar van der Wijk
Fabienne Gidding
PhD Student
Klaske is a plant breeder focused on improving crop resilience to abiotic stresses. She is analysing reproductive development of tomato germplasm with the aim of gaining detailed insight into the sub-traits that affect fertility under contrasting dry and humid heat conditions.
Fabienne Gidding
Elmar van der Wijk
Fabienne Gidding
PhD Student
Fabiënne’s research will focus on the analysis of tomato anther development during heat stress using the newly applied technique single-cell RNA sequencing. Her research will unravel how tomato anther development is regulated at a very high resolution and how this development is hampered during heat stress, resulting in heat-induced pollen abortion.
Group Photos
