Nobel laureate Sydney Brenner famously said that all problems in biology are versions of three basic questions: How does it work? How is it built? How did it get that way? I’m both pleased and excited, to be one of the members of the Scientific Advisory Panel for the Centre. My background is a bit like the infinitesimal model, in that I know a
We are pleased to announce that the Centre has formed new partnerships with BASF led by Partner Investigator Dr Colin Cavanagh (Head of Crop Genetics and Biometrics); and Iowa State University led by Partner Investigator Professor Sotirios Archontoulis (Professor of Integrated Cropping Systems). These new partnerships build upon the existing partnerships that the Centre has and will contribute towards research being undertaken with Chief Investigators Mark Cooper and Graeme Hammer on using crop modelling via
The end of 2023 coincided with a flurry of conferences and meetings, several of which are highlighted below. We also held a three-day in-person Chief Investigator (CI) Workshop. We revisited our research program by discussing the most exciting findings to date and highlighted again our key research areas. Through looking back at how our research has progressed and evolved over the last 2-3 years, we
The University of Florida (UF) hosted the Genotype by Environment by Management (GxExM) Symposium II this month with 80 people attending in person and 348 people registering online. This year, the Symposium was a collaboration between the Centre for Plant Success, UF Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences and UF Horticultural Sciences Department. Through his work with the Centre, Mark Cooper led
Hello fellow Plant Success members and friends, As the end of the year approaches, so does our residency on the Researcher Development Group (RDG). We have been members of the RDG since its inception in 2021 and currently lead the Science Domain. The RDG consists of three domains: Science, Engagement and Wellness, that provide meaningful, high quality professional development to
As spring arrives in Australia and the Jacarandas blooming in Queensland, it’s great to see lots of collaborations, research outputs, and events coming to fruition! I would like to take this opportunity to thank and congratulate all of those who have volunteered their time to help produce and participate in Outreach initiatives over the last few months. The National Science Quiz was held
Earlier this year, I visited the Centre’s University of Queensland Node, where I brainstormed with members of the Centre – especially Professor and Chief Investigator, Daniel Ortiz-Barrientos – about how evolutionary approaches could aid in crop adaptation to climate change. These discussions led to a review that recently appeared in Molecular Plant. The disciplines of evolutionary biology and plant and
This is my fourth Centre of Excellence (CoE). The previous ones were in complex systems, bioinformatics, big data and modelling, and now plant systems. They have all been very different. The most important issue that I have learnt is that being in a CoE is hard, and it should be hard. We all have an obligation to take the time
The Centre held its third annual Research Retreat and second annual Early Career Researcher (ECR) Workshop in Cairns last week with 108 and 74 in-person attendees respectively. It was great to hear from so many of our Centre Members on their recent research achievements and discuss future directions. The Research Retreat began with a Welcome to Country from the Minjil group who
There is much interest in the new generation Artificial Intelligence (AI) chatbots, including ChatGPT. In part, such platforms are designed to mimic or reproduce human “conversations” including scientific discussion, with functionality stretching to writing and debugging computer code. Without a doubt these new platforms will change the scientific landscape, but will scientists and researchers become redundant? Will future scientists need
