Ad banner: germinating plant, Utrecht University, VACANCY: Postdoc position in Experimental & Computational Plant Biology

I am excited to announce that we have two open positions on our recently funded MYBstery M-WEAVE (NWO-DFG) project!

1) Postdoc in my team at Utrecht University (NL). www.uu.nl/en/organisat...

2) PhD in the team of @lauraragni.bsky.social at University of Freiburg (DE). (See thread)

@bramvandijk.bsky.social (and many other)'s new paper covered insights in microbial ecology, evolution and theoretical biology.

Collaboration for Understanding | Searching for the Asgards YouTube video by Schmidt Ocean

And ‘Searching for the Asgards’ the movie: www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgmE...

A multiscale growth atlas of Arabidopsis: linking cell dynamics to organ development Plant development depends on coordinated growth at cellular and organ scales, yet comparative analyses are hindered by inconsistent reporting of growth across studies. We conducted a meta-analysis o.....

How fast do plants actually grow? And which growth processes matter most for organ size?
We dived into 176 papers, extracted and re-analyzed the data so you don’t have to!
nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
@newphyt.bsky.social @virajalim.bsky.social @elvisbranchini.bsky.social

Dr. Bruno Guillotin

Welcome and congratulations to Bruno Guillotin on joining IPS2 as a permanent researcher!
May the spirit of science always be with you and inspire your future discoveries. #PlantScience
ips2.u-psud.fr/en/articles/...

Delighted to be awarded NWO VIDI grant! We will study how microbes shape root cells to enhance plant stress resilience - so exciting!!!!

www.nwo.nl/en/news/149-...

Fantastic to see several plant projects granted🌽🌱

The mystery deepens: how did all complex life on Earth originate? In this intriguing VPRO Tegenlicht episode (in Dutch), PhD student Max Raas from the @kopslab.bsky.social talks about his collaboration with Berend Snel. They study the evolution of cell division machinery in single-celled organisms.

Wonderful news for our team!

Congratulations to Daniel on receiving this award, and looking forward to more archaeal research in our unit! 🦠 💻 📊 🧑‍🔬

@utrechtuniversity.bsky.social @ubc-uu.bsky.social

DEEP seeks Associate Professor in Plant Ecology – apply now! - Department of Ecology, Environment and Plant Sciences DEEP seeks Associate Professor in Plant Ecology – apply now! - Department of Ecology, Environment and Plant Sciences

Come be my colleague! Tenured Associate Professor position opening in Plant Ecology at my department @stockholm-uni.bsky.social www.su.se/department-o...

Very excited to share that our paper "A RALF-brassinosteorid signaling circuit regulates Arabidopsis hypocotyl cell shape" is now published in @currentbiology.bsky.social !

Enjoy reading it!!

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Gibberellin transport affects lateral root growth through HY5 in response to far-red light Gibberellin translocation from shoot to root conveys a plant-plant competition signal that leads to a reduction in lateral root growth.

My latest paper, a postdoc project of mine from the @ronaldpierik.bsky.social lab is finally out in the Plant Cell all its formatted glory! doi.org/10.1093/plce...
Many thanks also to my co-authors and especially Kyra van der Velde who did a lot of work.

Coming to you live from #ISPLORE2025JP Fresh preprint from my lab showing that leaves progressively oxygenate and how this is important for their morphogenesis.Thanks to our collaborators from @Fra_LicO2si lab. #plantscience
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Drought inhibits thermomorphogenesis via salicylic acid‐mediated suppression of ELF3 phase separation Plants must respond properly to ensure growth and survival when facing complex environmental challenges. This study reveals that drought inhibits high temperature-induced thermomorphogenesis by enhan...

SA again!

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

My lab's very first manuscripts are out!!!!

- We identified nearly 60 conserved RNA structures in plastids #chloroplast #RNA
- We found that transcriptional response to warm temperatures in whole seedling is confounded by response at organ level #thermomorphogenesis

Link to both preprints below

Thrilled to have our spatial single-cell atlas of the Arabidopsis lifecycle in @NaturePlants. Turns out that its easy to make nice images when spatial expression of 1,000 genes is available! 1/n
@natanellae.bsky.social @tatsuyanobori.bsky.social @joeecker.bsky.social

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Thank you Kalika!

It's alive!! 🌱 Check out our combination of experimental approaches and computational modeling, showing how growth conflicts among neighboring cell files underlie the orientation of cell divisions in root regeneration. Such a rewarding experience to be part of this collaboration!

🌱 Passionate About Plant Development?
Join the "Summer School", a dynamic three-day intensive program tailored for enthusiastic PhD students and postdocs eager to deepen their understanding of plant developmental biology. Register here: www.graduateschool-eps.info/events/eps-s...

a maize shoot apical meristem labeled with a plasma membrane marker fused to cyan fluorescent protein

maize shoot apical meristems are the cutest! 😍
plasma membrane labeled with PIP2A-CFP

Scheme of meristem development in maize embryos, highlighting the expression domains of key regulatory genes.

The Cereal Stem Cell Systems Consortium published a comprehensive review in Plant Cell on how meristems shape cereal architecture.
If you are not a fan of cereals except for breakfast, your teaching will still benefit from the amazing figures!
‪@cerealcell.bsky.social‬
tinyurl.com/32a74xpd

Pablo's elegant figures are definitely a highlight!

Super excited to release a huge evolution project on the works for many years:

Evolution experiments synchronized across climates to understand rapid adaptation

Preprint: doi.org/10.1101/2025...
All data available: www.grene-net.org/data

#MOILAB
@ucberkeleyofficial.bsky.social
@hhmi.org

🧵👇

PhD Position in Multiscale Mechanistic Modelling of Animal Development How do protein interactions at the subcellular scale regulate the morphology of an entire organ? Join us to explore this question with computer models!

🚨 Join us at TBB Utrecht by applying for this evo-devo PhD position! 🚨

www.uu.nl/en/organisat...

A group of 12 scientists posing in front of the conference venue of ICAR 2025.

A strong showing from Utrecht at #ICAR2025!

Catch us as speakers, session chairs and at posters #42, 50 and 240 tonight!

#ICAR2025 has started! come join us tomorrow in Concurrent 2 to learn about computational models and how they help us understand plants 🌱🙂

Today we celebrate over 40 years of research of Rob de Boer, chair Professor of Theoretical Biology.

Rob complemented his tremendous scientific career with a deep impact in multiple roles, as a dedicated teacher, an inspiring mentor, and a kind and generous colleague. Thank you, Rob!

Temperature is so important for plants that they have come up with many independent temperature sensors.

Curious? Read more in this review by former WeigelWorld members Sridevi Sureshkumar & Suresh Balasubramanian.
#plantscience
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Last few days to apply to this position! Come join us to model plant stress responses across species in this @cropxr.bsky.social PhD position! 🌱🌽🌾🥬🌡️

🧩 PhD Position – Origins of Darwinian Inheritance 🧩

This joint PhD project between the @rug.nl (Rampal Etienne & Martijn Egas) and @utrechtuniversity.bsky.social (Bram van Dijk) explores how simple prebiotic systems could evolve reliable information transfer.

Apply here: shorturl.at/WgYMF

New vacancy in my team!

PhD student position on microbial genome evolution, focusing on the evolutionary principles underlying bacterial genome architecture.

Please repost and share with talented MSc students in #evobio, bioinformatics or related :)

www.uu.nl/en/organisat...

#MEvoSky #MicroSky