Research of the Biosystematics Group
Research in the Biosystematics Group is focused on the origins and evolution of biodiversity. We apply phylogenetic and comparative genomic methods to investigate these aspects at the molecular, population, species, and clade levels to address fundamental questions about speciation, domestication, species interactions and trait evolution.
Our research themes
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Biodiversity
Biodiversity is the variety and variability of life on Earth. It is essential for maintaining ecosystems and, consequently, a healthy living environment. Loss of biodiversity is therefore an important societal problem. Understanding how biodiversity can be promoted, and loss can be reduced are important focus areas for the Biosystematics Group. With our education, research, and outreach activities we contribute to greater understanding of biodiversity among students, policy makers, and the wider public. Our fundamental and applied research aims to promote biodiverse cropping systems and increase ecosystem complexity of urban green spaces. We engage in interdisciplinary teams that aim to protect and enhance biodiversity on life science university grounds and beyond.
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Crop diversity
The human diet is very diverse, both with respect to the crop species that are consumed world-wide and with respect to the region-specific preferences for different crop varieties. To ensure sufficient food for everyone now and in the future, we need to cherish traditional farmer-developed crop varieties and their wild relatives, which are adapted to local climate and soil conditions. In addition, unravelling the genetic basis underlying crop diversity will allow us to steer crop traits and develop more robust, climate-adapted crops. Therefore, we study crop diversity at different levels, including genomic, transcriptomic and metabolomic data from modern varieties, traditional varieties and wild relatives.
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Phylogenomics
Phylogenomics, the fusion of genomics and phylogenetics, serves as a vital tool in evolutionary biology. This approach clarifies species classification but also provides insights into the mechanisms driving biological diversity. At the Biosystematics group, we apply phylogenomics to analyze the wealth of existing and emerging genomic data, focusing not only on the nucleotide and protein sequences but also on the organization and collinearity between genomes. With our phylogenomic research we reconstruct evolutionary histories of species but also of the genes and genomes themselves.
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Species interactions
Interactions between different species are constantly evolving and play a central role in the diversification and organization of life. At the Biosystematics Group, we focus on various types of interactions including symbiosis, predation, and mutualism. We aim to unravel the evolutionary pathways that gave rise to intricate interactions between plants and their antagonists, such as pathogens and insect herbivores, as well as between insect herbivores and their symbionts and natural enemies (parasitic wasps). We study these interactions at different levels, including phenotypic, genomic, transcriptomic, and metabolomic, comparing between species and within species.
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Trait evolution
The characteristics of species can change over time due to mutations in the DNA. This trait evolution leads to diversity within a species and may confer fitness advantages in certain environments. Some new traits can become fixed and ultimately result in the origin of new species. At the Biosystematics group, we investigate the evolution of important traits across populations and species in both plants and animals. To uncover the genetic mechanisms underlying trait evolution, we study evolutionary changes in the structure of genomes, genes, and gene regulatory networks.