Recognizing Plant Cell first authors: Ni Jiang

Ni Jiang, first author of Three-dimensional Time-lapse Analysis Reveals Multiscale Relationships in Maize Root Systems with Contrasting Architectures

Current Position: Senior Computational Scientist, Topp Laboratory, Donald Danforth Plant Science Center

Education: Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering, B.S. in Biomedical Engineering, B.S. in Computer Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, China

Non-scientific Interests: movies, novels, and origami

Brief bio: I was first trained as a Biomedical Engineer with specializations in medical imaging and image analysis. In the last year of my undergraduate studies, I participated in a program which used X-Ray imaging to study the structure of rice tillers. It was exciting to be involved in plant science and research. With a love of technologies and plants, I started my PhD and focused on the development of high-throughput phenotyping tools for the study of plant architectures, genetics, and characteristics. After completing my PhD, I joined the lab of Dr. Christopher Topp at Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, where my work was centered around the development of different imaging technologies, computational tools, and statistical methods that can be applied to study root growth dynamics in response to environmental stress. I always focus on how my knowledge and skills can help plant biologists discover how plants work and develop more productive staple crops.