Joke De Jaeger-Braet: The Plant Cell First Author

Joke De Jaeger-Braet, first author of “Heat stress reveals a specialized variant of the pachytene checkpoint in meiosis of Arabidopsis thaliana”

Current Position: Ph.D. Student at IPM (University of Hamburg, Germany)

Education:    M.Sc. in Plant Biotechnology (University of Gent, Belgium)

B.Sc. Biochemistry and Biotechnology (University of Gent, Belgium)

Non-scientific Interests: Running, hiking, (lab)events planning and photography

Brief bio:

Since my childhood, I adore being outside in nature and I´m fascinated by plants. During my bachelor studies, my interest in the molecular aspects of plant biology grew. Not as a surprise to any of my friends and family, I chose Plant Biotechnology as a major during my master studies. My master thesis, carried out in the Cell Cycle Group of Lieven De Veylder (VIB, Gent, Belgium), inspired me to conduct fundamental research. Using dual-color flow cytometry analyses, I investigated the progression of endoreplication of different cell layers, mesophyll and epidermal cells, during leaf development, suggesting a dominant role for the epidermis in the determination of general rosette leaf morphology. After graduation, I joined the Department of Developmental Biology, headed by Arp Schnittger (IMP, Hamburg, Germany), to start my Ph.D. studies. Besides the effect of heat stress on the meiotic progression, as reported in this recent Plant Cell paper, I also work on translation control in maize to explore unknown translational regulatory mechanisms in plant meiosis.