PlantLink

PlantLink News June, July & August 2022

This special summer edition of the PlantLink newsletter contains news about a PlantLink EU writing grant from PlantLink and about our plans for the future, as well as the usual collection of interesting courses and meetings. Finally, we have a Researcher in the spotlight that you should all be familiar with. We in PlantLink would like to wish you all a good summer!

  1. New EU writing grant from PlantLink
  2. PlantLink is back on LinkedIn!
  3. Sign up for PlantLink day “New plant products” 5 October!
  4. Seminar on phenotyping and phytochemistry, 7 June
  5. 3rd PlantEd Conference – Germany, 5-7 Sept 2022
  6. NordPlant annual meeting, 30 November
  7. Registration for the Post-graduate courses in Life Sciences in Alnarp and Lund closes 7 June!
  8. PhD course “Analytical methods in chemical ecology” 25 July – 4 Aug 
  9. Two NOVA PhD courses in plant phenotyping
  10. Inauguration of Lantmännen’s Framtidsgården in Svalöv, 14 June
  11. Summary of our Fascination of Plants day
  12. The oat genome is out!
  13. Prizes and awards for plant researchers in the region!
  14. PlantLink touring the region
  15. Researcher in the spotlight is Erik Alexandersson

PlantLink News June, July & August 2022

This special summer edition of the PlantLink newsletter contains news about a EU writing grant from PlantLink and about our plans for the future, as well as the usual collection of interesting courses and meetings. Finally, we have a Researcher in the spotlight that you should all be familiar with. We in Plant Link would like to wish you all a good summer!

 

Newsletter Contents

  1. New EU writing grant from PlantLink
  2. PlantLink is back on LinkedIn!
  3. Sign up for PlantLink day “New plant products” 5 October!
  4. Seminar on phenotyping and phytochemistry, 7 June
  5. 3rd PlantEd Conference – Germany, 5-7 Sept 2022
  6. NordPlant annual meeting, 30 November
  7. Registration for the Post-graduate courses in Life Sciences in Alnarp and Lund closes 7 June!
  8. PhD course “Analytical methods in chemical ecology” 25 July – 4 Aug 
  9. Two NOVA PhD courses in plant phenotyping
  10. Inauguration of Lantmännen’s Framtidsgården in Svalöv, 14 June
  11. Summary of our Fascination of Plants day
  12. The oat genome is out!
  13. Prizes and awards for plant researchers in the region!
  14. PlantLink touring the region
  15. Researcher in the spotlight is Erik Alexandersson

 

1. New EU writing grant from PlantLink

We welcome researchers at Lund University and SLU Alnarp to apply for 40,000 SEK as support to write proposals for the EU calls related to Food Bioeconomy, Natural Resources, Agriculture and Environment. Deadline 17 June! Read more about it here.

 

2. PlantLink is back on LinkedIn!

PlantLink has revamped its LinkedIn platform and launched as a company profile instead. We will keep it much more active from now on. You find it here.

 

3. Sign up for PlantLink day “New plant products” 5 October!

The program for the upcoming PlantLink day with the theme “New plant products” is taking shape. We now have three confirmed keynote speakers. Robert Brummer (Örebro University, Sweden), on the topic of Plant-based Proteins for Health and Wellbeing and the national research center PAN Sweden, Heiko Rischer (VTT, Finland), on the topic of Plant cell cultures as food, and their work with coffee cells, and Morten Ambye-Jenson (Aarhus University, Denmark) on protein extraction from grasses and herbaceous legumes. The PlantLink day 2022 is on the 5th of October at SLU Alnarp, and will start before lunch with a tour of the Plant Protein Factory, and continue with seminars during the afternoon. Sign up for the event already now here!

 

4. Seminar on phenotyping and phytochemistry, 7 June, 13:00-14:00 CEST

The BT department and PlantLink are happy to invite you for a seminar with our Czech colleagues Lukáš Spíchal and Petr Tarkowski.
Triticum, H-house, SLU Alnarp, 7 June 13:00-14:30 
 
Lukáš Spíchal (Palacký University) “Plant phenotyping approaches in biostimulant research and development”
Petr Tarkowski (Palacký University) “Plant genetic resources and phytochemical methods”
 
It is also possible to join online via zoom:
Meeting URL:     https://slu-se.zoom.us/j/65552908222 
Meeting ID:     655 5290 8222
Passcode:    982632

 

5. 3rd PlantEd Conference – Germany, 5-7 Sept 2022

The 3rd PlantEd Conference will be held over three days, with open scientific sessions on genome editing technology in plants, followed by PlantEd Working Group (WG) sessions and a Management Committee (MC) meeting. The conference will be a hybrid event, with a limited number of participants (100 under current COVID-19 rules) physically present, combined with live streaming (up to 500 participants via the Talque platform). The PlantEd conference, a network for plant genome editing research across Europe and beyond, is an excellent platform for disseminating information, discussion, and connections and updating the latest research and innovation. Register and read more here.

 

6. NordPlant annual meeting

Will this year be 30 November in Lund with the theme “Envirotyping for plant breeding and precision agriculture” in conjunction with the Göte Turesson jubilee commemorating 100 years since the term Ecotype was coined. We have already some very prominent keynote speakers who have confirmed their attendance. Invited speakers with preliminary titles are Antoine Harfouche (UNITUS): Leveraging Explainable Artificial Intelligence to Advance Plant Phenomics Research and Decisions; Jose Luis Araus Ortega (University of Barcelona), TBA Fred Stoddard (University of Helsinki): Fitting faba bean for high-latitude farming; Therese Bengtsson (SLU): Pre-breeding for adaptation of spring barley to Northern latitudes; Nasir Uddin (Husqvarna group) AI and data science in a forest, green space and garden outdoor equipment company. The program is almost ready and you can register here.

 

7. Registration for the Post-graduate courses in Life Sciences in Alnarp and Lund closes 7 June!

These short hands on PhD courses have now run for over 20 years – they are classic! Read more about them and register here latest by 7 June!

 

8. PhD course “Analytical methods in chemical ecology” 25 July – 4 Aug

This is a hands on course for future users and is given by Björn Bohman at SLU Alnarp! More information about the course here!

 

9. Two NOVA PhD courses in plant phenotyping

The registration for the NOVA PhD course organised by NordPlant at SLU Alnarp/Lund: “Phenotyping Technologies in Plant-Environment Interactions – Common Data Standards and Omics Technologies in Phenotyping”, 28 November – 2 December 2022 is now open here! There is also a second NOVA PhD course on High throughput field phenotyping, 5 ECTS, uly 4 – July 8, 2022 at NMBU in Ås Norway. More information and sign up here.

 

10. Inauguration of Lantmännen’s Framtidsgården in Svalöv, 14 June

This is also an online event which can be followed online! More information and sign up via LinkedIn here.

 

11. Summary of our Fascination of Plants Day

The  Fascination of plants day on the 18 of May with the theme”Plants to the rescue? Roles of plants to mitigate climate change” was a success where several important aspects of plants lifted and what their role might be to counteract climate change.

The invited speakers were Marie Nyman, retiring Chief Secretary of Gentekniknämnden, Eva Johansson, director of SLU Grogrund, Martin Sykes, professor emeritus at the Department of Physical Geography and Ecosystem Science, and Eva Tornberg, professor emeritus and founder of Veg of Lund. Read a short summary on our homepage here.
 

 

12. The oat genome is out!

A consortium have sequenced the oat genome! Nick Sirijovski and Olof Olsson, Nikos Tsardakis Renhuldt and Johan Bentzer at ScanOats as well as Mats Hansson at LU had leading roles in this major effort together with Helmholtz Center Munich in Germany and over 20 other institutes. Several follow up papers are on their way. The Nature paper is found here.

ScanOats is an industry research center with involvement from Lantmännen, Oatly and Swedish Oat Fiber, Lund University, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences and RISE.

 

13. Prizes and awards for plant researchers in the region!

We congratulate the winners of the Sparbanken Skåne Innovation Award 2022
Awais Zahid, Erik Andreasson, Nagacharan Konakalla, Marit Lenman and Nam Kieu Phoung for “Parakletos knock-out, a way forward for sustainable potato production”, and also the runner ups “Probiotics for human use to increase yield, disease control and shelf-life of berries and tomatoes” by Ramesh Vetukuri and Farideh (SLU Alnaro) and Elisabeth Uhlig and Åsa Håkansson (Lund University) and “Vikarierande träd” by
Martin Brattström, student at SLU Alnarp. 
 
We also congratulate Mudassir Iqbal who received a royal award for research on biocontrol from the from the Swedish king Carl XVI Gustaf. Read more about it here!

 

14. PlantLink touring the region

Incoming director Federico and new coordinator Anna are currently doing a “tour de force” meeting with persons in the region with potential interest in PlantLink. There has been many fruitful discussions already with new thoughts and ideas. More information to come!

 

15. Researcher in the spotlight is Erik Alexandersson

Erik Alexandersson is a researcher at the Department of Plant Protection Biology at SLU Alnarp for 11 years now. You can read about what is new in his career here!