In 2021, I graduated with a Master of Science in Biology from Ghent University. My thesis, conducted at the Rhizosphere lab, focused on identifying bacteria capable of assisting lettuce in coping with cold stress. Following graduation, I joined the Lab of Microbiology under the supervision of Professor Anne Willems at Ghent University with Professor Sofie Goormachtig of the Rhizosphere lab as my co-supervisor, contributing to the 'Soja in 1000 tuinen' project. Here, I participated in a large-scale isolation campaign aimed at discovering rhizobia strains within soybean root nodules capable of nodulating soybeans at northern latitudes. Subsequently, in 2022, I obtained an FWO grant to investigate the underlying mechanisms behind variations in nodulation efficiency among different Bradyrhizobium strains, with the goal of optimizing this interaction.

Sonia obtained her PhD in Biochemistry and Biotechnology in 2022 in the group of Prof. Anne Willems (Laboratory of Microbiology, University of Gent) and Prof. Sofie Goormachtig (VIB-UGent Center for Plant Systems Biology). During her PhD, she studied the effect of low temperatures on the microbiome of two cold tolerant plants, Valerianella locusta and Poa annua, and the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana. The aim was to identify bacteria able to alleviate cold stress in plants. She is now a postdoctoral scientist in the group of Prof. Sofie Goormachtig at VIB-UGent Center for Plant Systems Biology since 2023. As a part of the BOOSTER project, she investigates how drought shapes maize microbiomes to identify drought-enriched bacteria that might promote plant growth under this abiotic stress and understand their mode of action.

Post-doctoral fellow

Judith is a postdoctoral scientist in the group of Prof. Sofie Goormachtig at VIB-UGent Center for Plant Systems Biology (FWO fellowships) since 2019. She obtained her PhD in 2016 in the group of Prof. Dirk Inze, where she focused on the regulation of Arabidopsis leaf growth by sugars. After her PhD, she joined the group of Dr. Vanessa Wahl at the Department of Prof. Mark Stitt in the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Plant Physiology (Potsdam, Germany), where she studied the effect of limited nitrogen availability on flowering and tuberization in Arabidopsis and potato. In her current research, she uses this expertise to investigate plant-microbe symbiotic interactions in different plant crops. Her main focus is unraveling the role of sugar signaling during soybean and pea nodulation.

I completed my Master’s degree in Biochemistry and Biotechnology at Ghent University in 2021. During my studies, I conducted my Master’s thesis research in the Vascular Development lab at PSB. Presently, I am pursuing my PhD through a collaborative effort involving the company Aphea.Bio and two research labs at PSB: the Advanced Live Cell Imaging and Rhizosphere labs. My current research focuses on unraveling the mode-of-action of biocontrol agents against fungal pathogens in wheat.