Raaijmakers Group
Raaijmakers Group
Microbial Ecology
The goal of our research program is to unravel the functional diversity of microbes living on and inside plants. The microbial functions we study in detail comprise protection of plants against biotic and abiotic stresses. By developing microbial strategies to enhance plant stress tolerance, we contribute to sustainable crop production with minimal use of fertilizers and pesticides.
The functional diversity of plant microbiomes is studied for different crop plant species and their wild relatives grown in native habitats or in agroecosystems. How plant domestication has impacted microbiome assembly is studied by GWAS/QTL analyses and exudate profiling of crop plant species and their wild relatives.
- Adopting metagenomics/transcriptomics, we have identified microbial consortia of bacterial and fungal genera that effectively protect plants against fungal and parasitic root diseases.
- The bacteria and fungi are subjected to genomic and chemical analyses to identify genes and metabolites involved in plant protection. The microorganisms and their metabolites are also part of other research areas, including antibiotic discovery projects.
