UNDERSTANDING AND IMPROVING CROP ROOT FUNCTION

Dr Peter J. Gregory is Emeritus Professor of Global Food Security at the University of Reading, UK, where he was previously Professor of Soil Science. Amongst many distinctions, Professor Gregory is a former President of the International Society of Root Research (ISRR) as well as former Chief Executive of the Scottish Crop Research Institute (now part of the James Hutton Institute) and East Malling Research (now NIAB-EMR). He is internationally-renowned for his research in soil and crop root science.

Tom Beeckman received his master’s degree in Botany from the University of Ghent, Belgium, in 1985 and completed his Belgian interuniversity postgraduate education in Marine Biology in 1989. After performing postdoctoral research at the Laboratory of Genetics (Ghent University), he became Group Leader of the Root Development Group at the Flanders Institute of Biotechnology (VIB) in 2001. He then became a Professor at Ghent University in 2007, teaching plant developmental biology. His current work aims to understand how the branching pattern of roots becomes established by disentangling the molecular basis of lateral root spacing mechanisms that guarantee an optimal uptake.

Amanda Rasmussen is Assistant Professor in the School of Biosciences at the University of Nottingham. She obtained her PhD at the University of Queensland, Australia (2011) before embarking on a Marie Curie International Incoming Fellowship at the University of Ghent (Belgium), followed by a Newton International Fellowship and the Nottingham Research Fellowship both at the University of Nottingham (UK).

Professor Malcolm Hawkesford is head of the Plant Sciences Department at Rothamsted Research and leads the Institutes contribution to the UK Designing Future Wheat strategic research programme. He is a Honorary Professor in Plant Sciences in the School of Biosciences, University of Nottingham. He is an investigator on multiple international programmes with Brazil and India, is a lead investigator in the Defra-funded Wheat Genetic Improvement Network, participates in multiple BBSRC-funded projects aimed at optimizing resource use in wheat and is the lead scientist for major wheat GMO field experiments at Rothamsted. He is chair of the Nutrient Use Efficiency Expert Working Group of the International Wheat Initiative.

Dr Roberto Tuberosa is Professor of Plant Biotechnology and Breeding in the Department of Agriculture and Food Science at the University of Bologna, Italy. Professor Tuberosa is internationally renowned for his genomic studies to dissect the genetic basis of drought resistance in cereals and how to leverage this knowledge toward the release of climate-resilient cultivars. He is on the editorial board of several leading journals, has been involved in many European and international research projects in cereal breeding, represents Europe in the International Crop Science Society (ICSS) and has published over 170 articles as well as edited a number of books. Amongst other honours, Professor Tuberosa has been elected a Fellow of the Crop Society of America.