The professorship carries out practice-oriented research on sustainable crop protection and the resilience of plants and ecosystems.
Crop protection methods are deployed to protect plants against insect plagues. However, many chemical products are harmful to the environment and their use is prohibited by the EU. Therefore, it is important that plants are protected in an ecologically sustainable manner and are made resilient against disease and insect plagues. To this end, mechanisms from and based on Nature itself can be used, for example by increasing the natural resistance of plants, the use of bio stimulants and new biologically inspired crop protection methods. Besides resilience to disease and plagues, the resilience to factors such as drought will become increasingly important in the light of climate change.
The professorship researches how we can make plants resilient again and how we can create a healthy ecosystem. We carry out this research together with students from the study programs Applied Biology, Nutrition & Healthy Living, and Earth & Climate.
The professorship works together with De Floriade, De Flevo Campus and various other companies. In addition, the professorship plays a part in a Nationale WetenschapsAgenda (translation: National Science Agenda) project on sustainable crop protection ‘Mimicking trichomes’ together with three teachers: Linda Nol, Bram Knegt and Shanice Martopawiro.
