Journal of Experimental Botany (JXB) 75th Anniversary Symposium

Jane Langdale

University of Oxford

Jane Langdale is currently Professor of Plant Development in the Biology Department at the University of Oxford and Professorial Fellow at The Queen’s College.

Jane’s research focusses on understanding the genetic mechanisms that underpin how leaves develop and how they evolved (www.langdalelab.com) and she is currently co-ordinator of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation funded ‘C4 Rice Project’ (www.c4rice.com).

She was elected a Member of EMBO in 2007, a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2015, an International Member of the US National Academy of Sciences in 2019 and a Corresponding Member of the Australian Academy of Sciences in 2020.

Kin Pan Chung

Wageningen University

Kin Pan Chung is an assistant professor at the Wageningen University & Research (WUR), the Netherlands. Pan obtained his PhD from the Chinese University of Hong Kong with a research focus on autophagy and protein trafficking in plants. He continued his academic career as a postdoctoral researcher at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology in Germany, where he developed multiple research lines including cytoplasmic inheritance and algal plastid biotechnology. In 2024, Pan joined the Laboratory of Plant Physiology at WUR, where he established the Cytoplasmic Genetics Group. His current research focuses on investigating the mechanisms of plastid and mitochondrial inheritance.

Steve Penfield

John Innes Centre

Steven Penfield completed his PhD at the John Innes Centre and moved to the University of York where he began work on environmental temperature effects on seeds under Professor Ian Graham. He subsequently obtained a Royal Society University Research Fellowship in 2006 and returned to the John Innes Centre in 2014 where he was appointed Professor of Crop Genetics in 2017. Steven is an expert on the effects of environmental variation on plant reproductive development, particularly seed development, seed yield and seed dormancy. He is best known for the discovery that progeny seeds do not sense the environment directly, but instead inherit environmental information directly from their mother plants while developing in the fruit.

Diane Beckles

UC Riverside

Dr. Diane M. Beckles is a Professor in the Department of Plant Sciences at the University of California, Davis. Her research focuses on studying the genes and pathways that impact the postharvest quality of fruits, vegetables, and cereals, using her expertise in biotechnology, biochemistry, and molecular physiology. She received her BSc in Biotechnology from the University of Sheffield and her Ph.D. from the University of Cambridge and has published over 90 research articles. Dr. Beckles is a passionate and award-winning academic mentor and advisor to diverse students globally. Originally from Barbados, she enjoys swimming with the green turtles in the pristine waters of her home country.

Professor Christine Raines

University of Essex

Christine graduated with a B.Sc. (Hons) Agricultural Botany, First Class from Glasgow University in 1982. Following which she was awarded a Glasgow University Scholarship and studied for a Ph.D. in Photosynthetic electron transport graduating in1986. Christine’s post doctoral research started in late 1985 at the Institute of Plant Science Research, Cambridge where she initiated a project cloning nuclear genes encoding enzymes of the C3 cycle. In 1988 Christine was appointed to a faculty position at the University of Essex being promoted to Professor in 2004. Christine has had a number of roles in the University including Associate Dean of the Graduate School (2001-2004), Head of the School of Biological Sciences (2011-201 and PVC research (2017-2021)

Christine also holds a number of external roles including Editor in Chief, Journal of Experimental Botany (2011- 2019) and President of the Society of Experiment Biology. Past roles: Chair of Plant Section, Society of Experimental Biology (2009- 2012), Co-Opted Member of UK Plant Federation Executive (2012), Associate Editor, Journal of Experimental Botany (2006- 2011), BBSRC Biofuels Committee (2007/8), EPSRC Bioenergy Committee (2008), Nuffield Bioethics Committee on Biofuels (2009-2011).

Christine’s research interests are in the area of plant molecular physiology focusing on photosynthesis. Current research is aimed at improving the yield of crops by re-engineering photosynthetic carbon metabolism and electron transport. Christine’s research has had continuous external funding over 30 years from BBSRC, NERC, Leverhulme, the EU and the Bill and Melinda Gates Charitable Foundation

: https://scholar.google.co.uk/citations?user=0a_cHtYAAAAJ&hl=en
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Berkley Walker

Michigan State University

Berkley Walker studies the multi-scale impact and mechanisms of photosynthesis…with a special emphasis on how photorespiration interacts with central metabolism and plant nutrition. While always interested in science, he original set off to be an entrepreneur, founding an energy bar company in high school and running it while earning an undergraduate degree in microbiology. After undergraduate studies and a stint as a product manager for an instrumentation company he decided that the scientists have all the real fun and returned to graduate school. He received his PhD at Washington State University and postdoctoral training with the United States Department of Agriculture at the University of Illinois before accepting an Alexander von Humboldt fellowship to Heinrich-Heine University in Duesseldorf, Germany. He is currently an associate professor in the Department of Energy-Michigan State University Plant Research Laboratory. He is a respected researcher and has published over 50 peer-reviewed journal articles, submitted a patent for an improvement to photosynthesis and given over 50 oral presentations domestically and internationally. He receives funding from multiple Department of Energy programs and currently holds two National Science Foundation grants to support the fantastic researchers in his lab. If you have any questions about photosynthesis, plant metabolism, or plant physiology generally, he invites you to send an email to [email protected]!

Madelaine Bartlett

Sainsbury Laboratory Cambridge

Dr. Bartlett has established an innovative research program at the nexus of plant developmental and evolutionary biology. The Bartlett lab integrates cutting-edge technology in imaging, genome editing, and genomics to connect molecular and morphological change in plant evolution. Dr. Bartlett received her BSc in Molecular Biology from the University of the Witwatersrand (South Africa), her PhD in Plant Biology from the University of California Berkeley, and performed postdoctoral research in maize genetics at Brigham Young University before starting her independent research program at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. In 2024, Dr. Bartlett took up a Research Group Leader position at the Sainsbury Laboratory Cambridge University. Among other honors, Dr. Bartlett was named the 2018 ‘Emerging Leader’ by the Botanical Society of America, and won the 2022 Maize Genetics Cooperation Marcus Rhoades Early Career award.

Cristóbal Uauy

John Innes Centre

Professor Cristóbal Uauy is a Group Leader in wheat genetics and genomics at the John Innes Centre, and Director-designate of the centre starting Sept 2025. His programme focuses on using genetics and genomics to improve both yield and quality components in wheat. His lab uses molecular genetic approaches to identify genes involved in wheat productivity traits and enhance the translation of this knowledge into improved varieties for farmers, industry and consumers. His lab also develops open-access tools and resources to enhance scientific discovery. He is passionate about training the next generation of crop scientists on both scientific and core skills and was recently awarded the 2021 Jeanie Borlaug Women in Triticum (WIT) Mentor Award. He has been named as a Web of Science Highly Cited Researcher (Plant and Animal Science) on multiple occasions. Cristóbal's work has been recognized by the Society of Experimental Biology President’s Medal (2014) and the Royal Agricultural Society of England Research Medal (2017). He studied Agronomy in the Universidad Católica de Chile and holds a PhD in Genetics from the University of California, Davis.

Teva Vernoux

ENS Lyon

Teva Vernoux is a group leader at the RDP Laboratory at the ENS de Lyon. His group investigates how endogenous signals drive robust and dynamic development in plants. Specifically, they explore how hormonal signals regulate rhythmic morphogenesis at the shoot apex. Using interdisciplinary approaches—including quantitative live imaging, biosensor development, functional genomics, structural biology, and modeling—they aim to uncover how these developmental signals operate across scales to shape shoot architecture.

Dr. Franziska Fichtner

Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf

Franziska Fichtner studied the function of the sugar-signalling metabolite trehalose 6-phosphate in arabidopsis and pea in the group of Mark Stitt at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology, Potsdam-Golm. After completing her PhD she continued working on the role of trehalose 6-phosphate in plant metabolism and development as a postdoctoral fellow, before moving to Christine Beveridge’s lab at the University of Queensland, where she investigated links between sugar and phytohormone signalling in shoot and root branching. Since 2022 she has her own team in the department of Plant Biochemistry at the Heinrich Heine University, Düsseldorf, where she is focussing on how trehalose 6-phosphate and other sugar signalling pathways shape plant architecture and metabolism.

Devang Meta

KU Leuven

Prof. dr. Devang Mehta is a tenure-track Special Research Fund Professor in the Faculty of Bioscience Engineering at KU Leuven in Belgium. Devang holds a bachelor’s degree in Biotechnology from VIT University, India, a Master’s in Systems & Synthetic Biology from Imperial College London, and a Doctor of Sciences degree from ETH Zurich (Switzerland). His past research has focused on engineering virus-resistance in cassava plants and inventing a new method for sequencing circular DNA called CIDER-Seq. He recently completed a postdoctoral stay at the University of Alberta in Canada, receiving the Carl Douglas Award from the Canadian Society of Plant Biologists in recognition of his significant contributions to plant proteomics. His new Laboratory for Experimental Plant Systems Biology (EPSB) at KU Leuven is focused on harnessing circadian biology to engineer climate-resilient traits, such as latitudinal adaptation, in plants. As a core member of the US NSF-funded Plant Cell Atlas network and the Leuven Institute for Single Cell Omics, he is also interested in developing single-cell approaches for plant proteomics. Apart from laboratory research, Devang writes popular science articles about genetic engineering and synthetic biology, as well as equity, diversity, and inclusion in the sciences. His writing has been published in magazines like Slate, Salon and Nature. He was previously an Early Career Advisor at the premier open access life science journal eLife and is a vocal advocate for reform in scholarly publishing.

Nicola Patron

University of Cambridge

Nicola Patron is an Associate Professor in the Department of Plant Sciences at the University of Cambridge. Her research group applies synthetic biology to investigate how phenotypes arise from network functions and to explore metabolic diversity, aiming to develop sustainable sources of natural products for medicine, industry, and agriculture. She holds a PhD in plant molecular biology and conducted postdoctoral research at the John Innes Centre and the University of British Columbia. In 2016, she established her research group at the Earlham Institute, where she also founded and directed the Earlham Biofoundry. She joined the University of Cambridge in 2024.