Research interests

Plants and animals can communicate also via chemical signals and I am interested in plant-aphid interactions with focus on their chemical ecology. Aphids feed on plants and come in contact with various metabolites in the phloem sap. However, it is neither fully known, which plant substances they encounter exactly nor how plants are able to prevent aphid feeding. Stylectomy (cutting the Bird cherry oat aphids’ stylet) with support of EPG (electrical penetration graph) will be used to collect phloem sap of barley plants and chemical substances, e.g. amino acid and secondary metabolites, of the phloem sap will be analysed. A future perspective is the analysis of the total metabolite profile of the phloem sap using metabolomics. I am working with Velemir Ninkovic as head of the working group in Uppsala and the chemical analyses will be done in cooperation with Ulrika Ganeteg and Torgny Näsholm, Plant Science Centre Umeå.

Publications

Kuhlmann, F., and C. Müller. 2011. Impacts of ultraviolet radiation on interactions between plants and herbivorous insects: a chemo-ecological perspective. Pp. 305-347 in U. Lüttge, W. Beyschlag, B. Büdel, and D. Francis, eds. Progress in Botany 72. Springer Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg.

Kuhlmann, F., and C. Müller. 2010. UV-B impact on aphid performance mediated by plant quality and plant changes induced by aphids. Plant Biol 12:676-684.

Kuhlmann, F., and C. Müller. 2009. Development-dependent effects of UV radiation exposure on broccoli plants and interactions with herbivorous insects. Environ. Exp. Bot. 66:61-68.

Kuhlmann, F., and C. Müller. 2009. Independent responses to ultraviolet radiation and herbivore attack in broccoli. J Exp Bot 60:3467-3475.

Travers-Martin, N., F. Kuhlmann, and C. Müller. 2008. Revised determination of free and complexed myrosinase activities in plant extracts. Plant Physiology and Biochemistry 46:506-516.