Ian Thomas Baldwin (born 1958) is an American ecologist.
Ian Thomas Baldwin (born 1958) is an American ecologist.
Baldwin studied biology and chemistry at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, and graduated 1981 with an AB. In 1989 he graduated with a PhD in chemical ecology from Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, Section of Neurobiology and Behavior. He was an Assistant (1989), Associate (1993) and Full Professor (1996) in the Department of Biology at SUNY Buffalo. In 1996 he became the Founding Director of the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology where he heads the Department of Molecular Ecology. [1] In 1999 he was appointed Honorary Professor at Friedrich Schiller University in Jena, Germany. In 2002 he founded the International Max Planck Research School at the Max Planck Institute in Jena. [2]
Baldwin's scientific work is devoted to understanding the traits that allow plants to survive in the real world. To achieve this, he has developed a molecular toolbox for the native tobacco, Nicotiana attenuata (coyote tobacco), [3] [4] and a graduate program that trains "genome-enabled field biologists" to combine genomic and molecular genetic tools with field work to understand the genes that matter for plant-herbivore, -pollinator, -plant, -microbial interactions in nature. [5] He has been a driver behind the Open Access publication efforts of the Max Planck Society and is one of the senior editors of the open access journal eLife. [6] [7] Since November 2020, the Department of Molecular Ecology is led by Acting Director Sarah O’Connor. The former Director Ian Baldwin now serves as Leader of the Research Group of a Scientific Member of the Max Planck Society (FG WiMi, Forschungsgruppe Wissenschaftliches Mitglied) and he continues his research at the Institute in this role. [8]
A herbivore is an animal anatomically and physiologically adapted to eating plant material, for example foliage or marine algae, for the main component of its diet. As a result of their plant diet, herbivorous animals typically have mouthparts adapted to rasping or grinding. Horses and other herbivores have wide flat teeth that are adapted to grinding grass, tree bark, and other tough plant material.
Chemical ecology is the study of chemically mediated interactions between living organisms, and the effects of those interactions on the demography, behavior and ultimately evolution of the organisms involved. It is thus a vast and highly interdisciplinary field. Chemical ecologists seek to identify the specific molecules that function as signals mediating community or ecosystem processes and to understand the evolution of these signals. The substances that serve in such roles are typically small, readily-diffusible organic molecules, but can also include larger molecules and small peptides.
Plant defense against herbivory or host-plant resistance (HPR) is a range of adaptations evolved by plants which improve their survival and reproduction by reducing the impact of herbivores. Plants can sense being touched, and they can use several strategies to defend against damage caused by herbivores. Many plants produce secondary metabolites, known as allelochemicals, that influence the behavior, growth, or survival of herbivores. These chemical defenses can act as repellents or toxins to herbivores or reduce plant digestibility. Another defensive strategy of plants is changing their attractiveness. To prevent overconsumption by large herbivores, plants alter their appearance by changing their size or quality, reducing the rate at which they are consumed.
The Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology is located on Beutenberg Campus in Jena, Germany. It was founded in March 1996 and is one of 80 institutes of the Max Planck Society. Chemical ecology examines the role of chemical signals that mediate the interactions between plants, animals, and their environment, as well as the evolutionary and behavioral consequences of these interactions. The managing director of the institute is Jonathan Gershenzon.
A cardenolide is a type of steroid. Many plants contain derivatives, collectively known as cardenolides, including many in the form of cardenolide glycosides (cardenolides that contain structural groups derived from sugars). Cardenolide glycosides are often toxic; specifically, they are heart-arresting. Cardenolides are toxic to animals through inhibition of the enzyme Na+/K+‐ATPase, which is responsible for maintaining the sodium and potassium ion gradients across the cell membranes.
May Roberta Berenbaum is an American entomologist whose research focuses on the chemical interactions between herbivorous insects and their host plants, and the implications of these interactions on the organization of natural communities and the evolution of species. She is particularly interested in nectar, plant phytochemicals, honey and bees, and her research has important implications for beekeeping.
Plants and herbivores have co-evolved together for 350 million years. Plants have evolved many defense mechanisms against insect herbivory. Such defenses can be broadly classified into two categories: (1) permanent, constitutive defenses, and (2) temporary, inducible defenses. Both types are achieved through similar means but differ in that constitutive defenses are present before an herbivore attacks, while induced defenses are activated only when attacks occur. In addition to constitutive defenses, initiation of specific defense responses to herbivory is an important strategy for plant persistence and survival.
Nicotiana attenuata is a species of wild tobacco known by the common name coyote tobacco. It is native to western North America from British Columbia to Texas and northern Mexico, where it grows in many types of habitat. It is a glandular and sparsely hairy annual herb exceeding a meter in maximum height. The leaf blades may be 10 centimetres (4 in) long, the lower ones oval and the upper narrower in shape, and are borne on petioles. The inflorescence bears several flowers with pinkish or greenish white tubular throats 2 to 3 centimetres long, their bases enclosed in pointed sepals. The flower face has five mostly white lobes. The fruit is a capsule about 1 centimetre long.
Bill S. Hansson is a Swedish neuroethologist. From June 2014 until June 2020, he was vice president of the Max Planck Society.
Jonathan Gershenzon is an American biochemist.
Wilhelm Boland is a German chemist.
David G. Heckel is an American entomologist.
Roger Sidney Goody is an English biochemist who served as director at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Physiology in Dortmund from 1993 until 2013. Since 2013 he is Emeritus Director of the institute.
Tritrophic interactions in plant defense against herbivory describe the ecological impacts of three trophic levels on each other: the plant, the herbivore, and its natural enemies. They may also be called multitrophic interactions when further trophic levels, such as soil microbes, endophytes, or hyperparasitoids are considered. Tritrophic interactions join pollination and seed dispersal as vital biological functions which plants perform via cooperation with animals.
Jane Elizabeth Parker is a British scientist who researches the immune responses of plants at the Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research.
Floral scent, or flower scent, is composed of all the volatile organic compounds (VOCs), or aroma compounds, emitted by floral tissue. Other names for floral scent include, aroma, fragrance, floral odour or perfume. Flower scent of most flowering plant species encompasses a diversity of VOCs, sometimes up to several hundred different compounds. The primary functions of floral scent are to deter herbivores and especially folivorous insects, and to attract pollinators. Floral scent is one of the most important communication channels mediating plant-pollinator interactions, along with visual cues.
A phytobiome consists of a plant (phyto) situated in its specific ecological area (biome), including its environment and the associated communities of organisms which inhabit it. These organisms include all macro- and micro-organisms living in, on, or around the plant including bacteria, archaea, fungi, protists, insects, animals, and other plants. The environment includes the soil, air, and climate. Examples of ecological areas are fields, rangelands, forests. Knowledge of the interactions within a phytobiome can be used to create tools for agriculture, crop management, increased health, preservation, productivity, and sustainability of cropping and forest systems.
Sarah E. O'Connor is an American molecular biologist working to understand the molecular machinery involved in assembling important plant natural products – vinblastine, morphine, iridoids, secologanin – and how changing the enzymes involved in this pathway lead to diverse analogs. She was a Project Leader at the John Innes Centre in the UK between 2011 and 2019. O'Connor was appointed by the Max Planck Society in 2018 to head the Department of Natural Product Biosynthesis at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology in Jena, Germany, taking up her role during 2019.
Georg Jander is an American plant biologist at the Boyce Thompson Institute in Ithaca, New York. He has an adjunct appointment in the Plant Biology Section of the School of Integrative Plant Sciences at Cornell University. Jander is known for his molecular research identifying genes for biochemical compounds of ecological and agricultural importance, particularly those plant traits involved in resistance to insect pests.
Bergamotenes are a group of isomeric chemical compounds with the molecular formula C15H24. The bergamotenes are found in a variety of plants, particularly in their essential oils.
Webpage of the Department of Molecular Ecology at the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Academics | |
| Other | |
