L.a.c.j. (laurentius) Voesenek

Biography

Plant Ecophysiology is the fascinating research area that studies the complex interactions between plants and their environment. The sessile lifestyle of plants forces them to live with an enormous range of different abiotic and biotic conditions, which can vary dramatically from minute to minute. Signals of a changing environment have to be perceived and integrated by plants. Among the abiotic signals that convey information to plants are light, mineral nutrients, wind, heat, temperature, and water status. On top of that, plants do not grow in isolation, they compete with other plants, they are the favourite menu of herbivores and they are attacked by fungi and microorganisms. Throughout their life cycle plants continuously respond to all these signals resulting in alterations of their physiology, morphology and development. Ultimately this may result in better survival and reproduction under harsh environmental conditions. The Plant Ecophysiology research group at Utrecht University studies the physiological and molecular mechanisms that enable plants to grow, compete and survive in stressful environments. More particular we focus on molecular mechanisms that enable plants to cope with flooded conditions and low light environments. Both stress conditions induce changes in plant growth, helping plants to either overgrow high water levels or to outcompete neighbours in dense vegetations. These growth responses are regulated by various plant hormones and a wide range of target genes that eventually leads to changes at the level of the cell wall. Approaches such as functional genomics, QTL analyses, on-line growth measurements, various types of microscopy and laser-driven hormone analyses are used frequently.

Research Interest

Biology