SLU professors

• Vilis Brukas, professor of forest planning
• Renée Båge, professor of domestic animal reproduction
• Georg Carlsson, professor of sustainable cropping systems
• Nils Fall, professor of veterinary epidemiology
• Johan Gaddefors, professor i företagsekonomi med inriktning entreprenörskap
• Flora Hajdu, professor of rural development in the Global South
• Marcus Hedblom, professor of landscape architecture
• Anke M. Herrmann, professor i markens näringsomsättning
• Magnus Karlsson, professor of plant pathology
• Åsa Ode Sang, professor of urban vegetation design
• Björn Vinnerås, professor of environmental engineering

• Nya professorer 2022, booklet about all new professors (pdf)

Umeå, 6 May

• Dag Fjeld, professor of forest technology, specialising in logistics
• Sylvia Larsson, professor of technical biomaterials science
• Michael Gundale, professor of forest vegetation ecology
• Hannele Tuominen, professor of forestry-related plant physiology
• Tommy Lundgren, professor of natural resource economics

Uppsala, 8 April

• Stergios Adamopoulos, professor of wood science and wood technology
• Göran Bergkvist, professor of weed ecology and weed control
• Stefan Bertilsson, professor of functional ecology in limnic systems
• Johan Bröjer, professor of equine internal medicine
• Anke Fischer, professor of environmental communication
• Volkmar Passoth, professor of food biotechnology
• Erika Roman, professor of domestic animal physiology
• Gulaim Seisenbaeva, professor of inorganic and physical chemistry
• Anna Skarin, professor of reindeer husbandry
• Marie Spohn, professor of the biogeochemistry of forest soils

Professors 2019

• Nya professorer 2019 - booklet about all new professors (pdf)

Professors installed in 2019, and their lectures 

Umeå, 24 May

Link to the presentation film with all five new professors that are to be installed in Umeå (in Swedish only)

• Ola Lindroos, Professor of Forest Technology
• Karin Öhman, Professor of Forest Planning
• Tomas Brodin, Professor of Aquatic Ecology

Professors installed in 2019

Alnarp, 10 May

Link to the presentation film with all five new professors that were installed in Alnarp

• Lisa Diedrich, Professor of Landscape Architecture
• Laura Grenville-Briggs Didymus, Professor of Integrated Plant Protection
• Thomas Randrup, Professor of Urban Open Spaces Management
• Johan A. Stenberg, Professor of Integrated Plant Protection
• Jean ("John") W. H. Yong, Professor of Horticultural Growing Systems

Uppsala, 22 March

See the presentation film with all five new professors that were installed in Uppsala.

• Helena Hansson, Professor of Agricultural and Food Economics 
• Robert Hart, Professor of Environmental and Natural Resources Economics
• Seema Arora-Jonsson, Professor of Rural Development in Sweden and Europe
• Anti Vasemägi, Professor of Fish Biology 
• Jiasui Zhan, Professor of Plant Pathology, especially Epidemiology

• Play list with all professors' recorded inauguration lectures
• See the presentation film about the six professors
• Professorspresentationer (pdf, a booklet mainly in Swedish, with summaries in English)

The new professors of 2018 gave their inauguration lectures and were installed on 23 March in Uppsala

• Jennie Barron, professor of agricultural water management
• Erik Bongcam-Rudloff, professor of bioinformatics
• Anders Glynn, professor of toxicology with a focus on food
• Anna Rising, professor of veterinary medicine biochemistry
• Eva Sköldebrand, professor of pathology
• Patrick Svensson, professor of agrarian history

• Professorspresentationer 2017 (pdf) (booklet presenting all the new professors, in Swedish and partly in English
• Film, play list: the new professors' lectures 2017

A brief introduction of the professors that gave lectures and were installed in Uppsala on 30-31 March , 2017

Sigrid Agenäs

Cows that are well taken care of give plenty of milk

Sigrid Agenäs' research concerns milk production in cows. Her goal is to understand factors that determine the secretory activity of the milk producing cells in the udder and to implement this knowledge in applied animal management. The factors she studies range from nutrition, metabolism and endocrinology to management factors like milking routines, housing systems and light, as well as interactions with reproduction, the immune system and the microbiota of the mammary glands.

• Film: Professor Sigrid Agenäs describes her research.
• Film: Professor Sigrid Agenäs' lecture 

Michele Casini

How does an exploited marine ecosystem work?

Michele Casini’s research concerns the assessment and management of marine fish stocks, as well as population and ecosystem dynamics, at national and international level. He investigates how exploited fish populations, particularly in the Baltic Sea, vary in time and space in relation to fishing pressure, predator-prey interactions, eutrophication and climate. His goal is to foster an ecosystem approach to fisheries management. He has more than 15 years’ experience within the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES).

• Portrait of Michele Casini. Photo: Ann-Christin Rudolphi
• Film: Professor Michele Casini describes his research. 
• Film: Professor Michele Casini's lecture

Pär Ingvarsson

Better adapted crops with the help of modern genetics

Pär Ingvarsson's research focuses on properties that control much of a plant's life – when in the season they bloom and how fast they grow in different environments. His aim is to understand how plants adapt, which genes and evolutionary processes that are involved and how quickly they can adapt to new conditions. These questions are particularly relevant today, given the rapid climate changes and the challenges these constitute for modern plant breeding.

• Portrait of Pär Ingvarsson. Photo: Jenny Svennås-Gillner, SLU
• Film: Professor Pär Ingvarsson describes his research.
• Film: Professor Pär Ingvarsson's lecture

Anders H Karlsson

Quality meat production

Anders Karlsson's research focuses on meat quality; how properties such as tenderness, colour, flavour, and water holding capacity are influenced by genetic factors and production factors such as feeding, housing and management. Solving quality problems requires a fundamental understanding of the muscle anatomy, physiology and metabolism. Anders Karlsson has previously focused on pigs, and to some extent on poultry. Today he works primarily with ruminants, and tries to understand how feeding strategies and genotypes, but also animal welfare and the interaction between humans and animals, may affect the eating quality.

• Portrait of Anders Karlsson. Photo: Jenny Svennås-Gillner, SLU
• Film: Professor Anders Karlsson describes his research.
• Film: Professor Anders Karlsson's professorsföreläsning

Thomas Keller

Soil structure – the functional architecture of soil

Thomas Keller's research concerns the structure of agricultural soils, a property that is dynamic and constantly changing due to climatic forces, biological activity, and disturbance in the form of soil tillage and compaction by field traffic. His early research focused on processes resulting in the degradation of soil structure, especially soil compaction. His aim is to understand how natural processes shape soil structure and regulate its dynamics, and how we can obtain a healthy and stable soil structure through soil management.

• Portrait of Thomas Keller. Photo: Jenny Svennås-Gillner, SLU
• Film: Professor Thomas Keller describes his research.
• Film: Professor Thomas Keller's lecture

Inger Lilliehöök

Clues to correct diagnosis

Inger Lilliehöök's research area is veterinary clinical pathology, which involves laboratory analysis of samples such as blood, body fluids or tissue aspirates from ill animals to detect changes indicative of a disease or to follow the response of a patient to treatment. Lilliehöök has often validated various diagnostic methods to prove they function well in different animal species, and even in different breeds within a species. In order to improve knowledge on how clinical pathology tests should be interpreted, she studies how various blood substances change over time in different diseases.

• Portrait of Inger Lilliehöök. Photo: Jenny Svennås-Gillner, SLU
• Film: Professor Inger Lilliehöök describes her research.
• Film: Professor Inger Lilliehöök's lecture

Torbjörn Lundh

New diets must suit both animals and their gut flora

Torbjörn Lundh´s research originally focused on the metabolism of bioactive feed components, such as phyto-oestrogens, in different animal species. Today his research addresses the increased demand for novel feed resources based on byproducts from agriculture and forestry. He has a special interest in the applicability and metabolism of novel feed stuffs, and diet effects on the gut and interaction with gut microbiota. Most of his present projects concern feeds for fish.

• Portrait of Torbjörn Lundh. Photo: Jenny Svennås-Gillner, SLU
• Film: Professor Torbjörn Lundh describes his research.
• Film: Professor Torbjörn Lundh's lecture

Thomas Oles

Landscape thinking

Thomas Oles is a landscape architect whose research can be divided into two general areas of inquiry. The first is historical and geographical study of the ways people and societies shape their biophysical environment. He is especially interested in identifying and comparing landscape 'archetypes', or those structures that tend to persist across time, space, and culture. His second research area is methodological in character and concerns landscape as a way of understanding the world, 'landscape thinking'. The primary products of his inquiries are books written for academic and general readers.

• Portrait of Thomas Oles. Photo: Jenny Svennås-Gillner, SLU
• Film: Professor Thomas Oles describes his research.
• Film: Professor Thomas Oles' lecture

Jean François Valarcher

Infectiology beyond boundaries

Jean-François Valarcher's research aims to improve viral disease control in cattle. At the start of his career, he focused on respiratory diseases in calves and the bovine respiratory syncytial virus (BRSV), and later on he developed vaccine candidates against BRSV and the Bluetongue virus. He has also been devoted to major transboundary diseases, such as the foot-and-mouth disease virus. Present research includes characterisation of infectious disease mechanisms and development of new control measures.

• Film: Professor Jean François Valarcher describes his research.
• Film: Professor Jean François Valarcher's lecture

New professors in 2016 in Uppsala and Umeå

• Professorspresentationer 2016 (pdf) (booklet presenting all the new professors, in Swedish and partly in English

Brief introduction of the professors that were installed in Umeå, and their lectures that were held on May 13, 2016

• Film from  the lectures in Umeå, May 13, 2016

Vaughan Hurry

Life in a hothouse world

Vaughan Hurry´s research focuses on changes that occur in different types of plants as they acclimate to unfavourable growth temperatures, and the role that nutrient availability plays in constraining these acclimation processes. His research currently has two main themes: One is how environmental "signals" are sensed and, in turn, converted into a genetic response, and the second is how primary metabolism is modulated in response to fluctuations in growth temperature. One application of this research is the development of new tools for increased stress tolerance in herbaceous crops and forest plantation species.

Karin Ljung

Hormones control the underground life of plants

Karin Ljung´s research is focused on mechanisms regulating plant growth and development. She has combined a keen interest in developing new, advanced methods for analysis of plant metabolites with an interest in developmental processes in plants. She is particularly interested in two areas of research: the roles played by plant hormones (substances that regulate plant growth) during root system development, and the role of these compounds in the coordination of above and below ground growth.

David Parsons

Finding clarity in complexity

David Parsons uses models as tools for understanding farming systems and agricultural production chains and for exploring better ways to manage them. His has conducted research in the areas of farming systems, smallholder crop-livestock systems, whole farm modelling, crop modelling, forage agronomy, and climate change adaptation. In particular, he has led research projects in Central Vietnam, developing profitable and sustainable beef cattle production.

Arne Pommerening

Analysing and modelling forest structure

Arne Pommerening is a forest biometrician specialising in relating woodland structure to ecological and management processes. He started his career studying the relationship between ecological patterns and processes using point process statistics. His findings in forest structure research provided him with a new, unique access to plant growth and interaction modelling. He enjoys an extensive international network of research collaborations, has many national and international responsibilities and also sits on the editorial board of a number of scientific journals.

Brief introduction of the professors that were installed in Uppsala, and their lectures that were held on April 15, 2016

• Programme for the lectures and the ceremony in Uppsala, April 15, 2016 (two lectures in Swedish, two in English)
• Film from the lectures in Uppsala, April 15, 2016

Watch the video inteview with Tomas Roslin, professor in Insect Ecology.

Watch the video inteview with Lotta Berg, professor in Animal Environment and Health.

Watch the video inteview with Peter Bozhkov, professor in Biochemistry.

Lotta Berg 

Animal welfare from farm to abattoir

Lotta Berg's research focus is on the interaction between animals, management and the environment. Her main focus is on farm animals including farmed fish, but she also works with companion animals and wildlife, including One Health related issues. The primary objective is to prevent disease and behavioural problems by carrying out research related to animal housing, management, biosecurity and behavioural needs. One area where more knowledge is warranted is animal welfare at the time of slaughter and killing. This specific field of research involves animal behaviour, anatomy and physiology, but also human behaviour, law, ethics and product quality, and is hence truly interdisciplinary.

Peter Bozhkov

Studying cell death to understand life

Peter Bozhkov´s main research area concerns the genetically controlled process of programmed cell death in plants. Peter Bozhkov was one of the first scientists to demonstrate the importance of cell death for plant life, and he has also discovered unique mechanisms regulating the death of plant cells. Today, he also studies how intracellular breakdown of macromolecules and organelles contributes to plant development, aging and stress responses.

Andrea Nightingale

Understanding how societies and environments transform

Andrea Nightingale is a geographer who combines social and natural sciences in order to understand the complex relationships that shape social and environmental change. Inspired by feminist theory she explores the ways that gender, class, race, ethnicity and other forms of social difference end up literally manifesting on the landscape. Her work has shown that it is critical to reject simplistic explanations for how societies shape environments and rather to recognize that political economies, knowledge, social relations, ecologies and cultural histories all intertwine to produce the kinds of environments and environmental conflicts we are witnessing today. A large part of her field work has been carried out in Nepal.

Tomas Roslin

Insects rule the planet

Tomas Roslin´s research originally focused on insect-plant interactions in patchy landscapes, but he has later turned to all kinds of biotic interactions. His key aim is to reconstruct full interaction webs, spanning species competing with each other, species eating each other, species pollinating each other etc. What intrigues him is how populations tied together by versatile, live interactions react to each other and to environmental change. His favourite systems include dung beetles, herbivorous insects and their natural enemies on oaks, and food webs of the high Arctic. In his work he applies recent, molecular techniques for identifying both species within interaction webs, and the links between them.

Read the presentations of the new professors in yearly booklets and web pages from previous ceremonial installations (in Swedish and partly in English)

New professors 2015

• Presentationer - Professorsinstallationer 2015 (pdf, 3 Mb, booklet presenting all the new professors, in Swedish and partly in English)
• Films from the lectures 2015: professorsinstallation, Ultuna, 16 april, professorsinstallation, Ultuna, 17 April

Brief introduction of the professors that are to be installed in Uppsala, and their lectures that are to be held on April 16-17, 2015

Magnus Appelberg 

Fish as a resource and an environmental indicator in a changing world

Magnus Appelberg has focused his research on developing fish-based environmental monitoring and assessment. His work covers both freshwater and marine habitats and comprises methodological as well as ecological aspects. Management of natural resources needs to have an adaptive, ecosystem-based approach, which systematically incorporates new knowledge based on research, and environmental assessment based on research and evaluations of completed actions.

Anders Broberg 

Secondary metabolites – fascinating and useful

Anders Broberg's research area is natural product chemistry. His main interest is secondary metabolites from plants, fungi and bacteria. These substances typically have a very special function in the organism, such as protection against enemies, and sometimes they can be useful in other contexts, for example as antibiotics. Part of his research involves the isolation and structure determination of such metabolites, another part is devoted to studies of their biological properties and how they are formed.

Anna Gårdmark 

Size matters for fishing and fish interactions

Anna Gårdmark’s research focuses on the interactions between fish and their prey and predators, and how these species interactions influence the effects that fishing and environmental changes have on exploited ecosystems. Using these new findings, she also develops new methods of advice for fisheries and marine management. Such knowledge and applications are necessary prerequisites for the development of sustainable fisheries, both now and in the climate of the future.

Magdalena Jacobson 

Pig infections are important for the pig – but also for man and environment

Magdalena Jacobson is an expert on infectious diseases in pigs. In her research, she develops and evaluates diagnostic methods for pig diseases such as scabies and proliferative enteropathy (Lawsonia infection). She has also developed animal models for studying, for example, the significance of the immune system in intestinal diseases such as swine dysentery and proliferative enteropathy. She also works with programmes for the eradication of some of these diseases.

Björn Lindahl 

Fungi determine carbon sequestration in soils

Björn Lindahl is a soil biologist, focusing on the role of fungi in soil processes. He studies the interplay between fungal communities and their environment; how community composition depends on environmental parameters and disturbances, but also how fungi affect their environment, primarily as degraders of organic matter. He is particularly interested in mycorrhiza, and by using a combination of isotope analysis and modern molecular methods he has shown that mycorrhizal fungi play a central role in regulating long-term carbon storage in boreal forest soils.

Görel Nyman 

Improving survival among anesthetised horses

Görel Nyman is a veterinarian and a specialist in anesthesia and analgesia. Her research aims to improve care and patient safety for animals during surgery. She has developed a method that increases oxygenation of the blood in horses under anesthesia, thereby decreasing the lactic acid concentration in muscles. As the first clinic in the world, SLU’s University Animal Hospital in Uppsala now offers this treatment under anesthesia.

Erik Petersson 

Preserving salmonids in developed rivers

Erik Peterson's research is closely linked to the rearing and stocking of salmonids to compensate for losses caused by hydro-electrical power plants. Important issues are how to rear fish that are successful when released into the wild, and how to preserve the genetic variation in the population. Behavioural studies of wild and hatchery fish are an important component of his research, looking for example at mating behaviour, mating success, and anti-predator behaviour.

Tord Snäll 

A forestry that preserves forest-dwelling species

Tord Snäll’s research is focused on understanding species dispersal and colonization in the forest landscape, with emphasis on arboreal mosses and lichens. With in-depth knowledge about the biology of the species, he develops computer models that describe the species’ chances of survival in the landscape, depending on how future forestry is conducted and how the climate changes. The goal is forestry that delivers forest products while at the same time preserving biodiversity. Today he also investigates the possibility of using simpler models based on citizen science data, i.e. species observations delivered by the public to websites.

Catarina Svensson 

Prevention is better than cure

Catarina Svensson began her research career with studies on coccidiosis in grazing calves and has also studied how calf health is affected by housing and management and how cow health, fertility, milk production and longevity are influenced by rearing factors and energy balance. Her main focus today is on herd health management in cattle, and she has a great interest in methodology in preventive veterinary medicine and herd health counseling.

Christian Swensson 

Milk is grass

Christian Swensson’s research concerns cattle and dairy production, with a focus on environmental issues such as improving nitrogen efficiency and mitigating climate effects. He views dairy production as an unavoidable part of agriculture in a country like Sweden, with large areas ideal for ley production. He is also conducting research on maize silage, covering both nutritional and cultivation aspects.

Barbro Ulén 

Culturing food without over-fertilising water

Barbro Ulén’s research concerns leaching of phosphorus, nitrogen and pesticides from agricultural land to water. She is particularly interested in how phosphorus is transported in clay soils and further via tile drains. In her work she develops agricultural and other measures to reduce nutrient leaching and describes how the risk of phosphorus and pesticide leaching is affected by hydrological, physical and chemical conditions in the soil.

Helena Wall 

Strengths and challenges in Swedish poultry production

Helena Wall’s research concerns poultry, and her goal is a production that combines good animal welfare with production performance, including high product quality and a low environmental load. Her studies on laying hens include effects of housing, management and nutrition on production performance, egg quality and bird well-being. She also investigates domestic protein sources as a substitute for soy in feed for broilers and layers.

Read about the installation lectures of new professors in Uppsala 2014, and about their research.

• Presentationer - Professorsinstallationer 2014  (pdf, 3 Mb, booklet presenting all the new professors, in Swedish and partly in English)
• See the films from the installation lectures (mainly in Swedish). 

Brief introduction of the professors that are to be installed in Uppsala, and their lectures that are to be held on April 3-4, 2014.

Åsa Berggren:

The dispersal of insects in old and new areas

Åsa Berggren is a conservation biologist focusing on factors that influence insect movement and dispersal into new areas. Humans affect the dispersal of insects by changing the environment, and by the transportation of goods. This causes survival problems for some insects, while others reach new areas as stowaways in cargo. In both ecosystems and in production systems, new species may negatively affect other species and also carry new diseases. Åsa Berggren’s research is important for the conservation of threatened species as well as for the management of exotic species.

Anders Dahlberg:

Fungi are far more than what we see

Anders Dahlberg's research focuses on the biology of fungi: where different species are to be found and the reasons for this, how they contribute to various processes in nature and how their diversity can be managed. He is also engaged in outreach activities, trying to popularise research and to transfer fungal knowledge to conservation practitioners.

Lars Edenius:

More ungulate forage in forests – a way of reducing damages

Lars Edenius’ research focuses on the management of ungulates and their food resources, in collaboration with forestry, hunters and other stakeholders. He is particularly interested in the possibility of creating more forage by adjusting daily forest practices so that browsing is diverted away from sensitive forest stands and trees. Examples of such adaptations include making tops and branches more available at harvest and creating high stumps with living branches during pre-commercial thinning. Lars Edenius holds an external collaboration specialist position at SLU with emphasis on ungulate management.

Agneta Egenvall:

Should the horse last longer?

Agneta Egenvall is an epidemiologist and studies diseases in animal populations, an area where statistics from insurance companies and breed societies are extremely valuable. She has worked on a number of animal species and diseases, but now focuses on the durability of horses. Her research has shown that the individual rider or trainer has a fairly large impact on the level of injury among top European jumping horses. To gain a better understanding of this rider and trainer effect, she combines statistics collection with the study of the biomechanical interaction between horse and rider when horses are ridden.

Tuija Hilding-Rydevik:

Environmental policy and implementation – tools and conditions for learning

Tuija Hilding-Rydevik’s research concerns how professionals in public organisations deal with environmental issues – how they reason, what concepts they use, how they prioritise when faced with conflicting  goals, for example environmental versus financial gains, how they use environmental impact assessments and other environmental policy tools, how they manage new environmental tasks etc. Her research reveals the details of the final steps in the implementation of environmental and sustainability policy and how decisive these steps are for the “implementation gap” – that is the difference between the intended outcome of a policy and what is actually achieved.

Hossein Jorjani:

Genetic information services for improvement of livestock

Hossein Jorjani is a quantitative geneticist specialised in dairy cattle breeding. His research concerns traits that are determined by hundreds or thousands of genes in interaction with the environment. He is the senior geneticist at the Interbull Centre, based at SLU, and in that capacity contributes to the development of effective methods for genetic evaluation of dairy cattle in more than 30 countries.

Kostas Karantininis:

With farm and business economics in focus

Kostas Karantininis is an economist with focus on farms, value chains and agri-business. He studies the competitiveness of the agri-food industry and the impact of biotech foods. Rural development, the economic organisation of farm cooperatives, sustainability and food waste are also among his research interests.

Anders Kiessling:

Aquaculture a part of our future food production

Anders Kiessling is a biologist specialising in fish farming. His main focus, besides promoting aquaculture as a subject in research and teaching, is on new feed sources that do not interfere with food production. Yeast farmed on food waste and blue mussels recapturing nutrients from the Baltic Sea are two examples of such feed sources. He has a vision to develop a land-based closed production system, where nutrient-rich waste water from fish farming is used to fertilise vegetables.

Anders Kvarnheden:

Viruses wherever you look

Anders Kvarnheden’s research concerns viral diseases in plants, with the main focus on understanding their epidemiology and evolution. He works with viral diseases in several crops, both in Nordic conditions and in developing countries. His specialty is geminiviruses, such as the wheat dwarf virus that infests wheat in Sweden, and viruses that infest crops such as cotton, tomato and okra in the tropics.

Stephan Köhler:

What does a water sample tell us about its origin?

Stephan Köhler's research area is environmental geochemistry, focusing on water quality in lakes and streams, as well as in drinking water. He examines how humus, metals and other substances move between soil and water in catchment areas, and the factors that affect these flows. This research includes field and laboratory experiments, but also more theoretical modelling. Several of the projects he is involved in aim to secure the availability of safe drinking water, today and in the future.

Björn Lindahl:

New technology revolutionises fungal research

Björn Lindahl is a fungal ecologist, focusing on boreal forest ecosystems. He studies the interplay between fungal communities and their environment; how community composition depends on environmental parameters and disturbances, but also how fungi affect their environment, primarily as degraders of organic matter. He has a special interest in mycorrhizas, and by using a combination of isotope analysis and modern molecular methods he has shown that mycorrhizal fungi play a central role in regulating long term carbon storage in boreal forest soils.

Görel Nyman:

Improving survival among anesthetised horses

Görel Nyman is a veterinarian and a specialist in anaesthesia and analgesia. Her research aims to improve the care and patient safety of animals during surgery. She has developed a method that increases oxygenation of the blood in horses under anaesthesia, thereby decreasing the lactic acid concentration in muscles. As the first clinic in the world, SLU’s University Animal Hospital in Uppsala now offers this treatment under anaesthesia.

Paula Persson:

Preventing plant diseases

Paula Persson's research concerns plant diseases in crops. Her early work focused on bacterial diseases of plants, but her present studies involve many different types of pathogens. Her main interest is the interaction between pathogens, plant-associated microorganisms, cultural practices, crops and crop sequences. The aim is to use this knowledge to suppress plant disease development by using a well-planned cropping system. DNA-based diagnostic methods have become important tools in her studies of plant pathogens in the field.

Read about the installation lectures of new professors in Uppsala and Alnarp 2013, and about their research.

Insects serving agriculture

Read about the installation lectures of new professors in Uppsala and Umeå, and about their research.

Read more about the ceremonial installation of new professors at SLU in 2011 in the booklet presenting the professors and their research (mainly in Swedish, but with summaries in English).

• Presentationer - Professorsinstallationer 2011 (pdf, in Swedish and partly in English)

Brief introduction of the professors that are to be installed in Uppsala, and their lectures that are to be held held on March 31 and April 1, 2011.

Lars Andersson:

Timing essential for successful weeds

Lars Andersson’s research focus is on weed biology and control. His major concern is how germination and emergence in a species are adapted in time and space to climate, weather and cultivation measures. He investigates how these characteristics determine the species´ success as a weed in different cultivation systems. This knowledge constitutes an important base in the development of resource-efficient and environmentally-friendly control measures. In addition, this knowledge is crucial for the prediction of how changes in climate and cultivation systems will affect the weed flora composition and levels of weed infestation

Mikael Berg:

Viruses threatening our welfare

Mikael Berg’s research is focused on elucidating and understanding the nature of viruses, in particular the interactions between viruses and their hosts that lead to disease. One important aspect is how viruses circumvent the innate immunity of the host. The research tool he uses is viral genetics, which deals with the function and evolution of viral genes, as well as the host’s immune response. The aim is to achieve a better understanding of the mechanisms that enable viruses to cause disease, jump host barriers, and to become new potential human pandemics.

Britt Berglund:

Dairy cow breeding with a longevity perspective

Britt Berglunds’ research deals with genetic aspects of dairy cow health, reproduction and welfare traits. One area has been to find reasons behind a high stillbirth rate in first-calving Holsteins and how to genetically improve this situation. Her research also deals with improved phenotypes expressing a greater amount of the genetic variation, such as better measures of early fertility, the energy balance after calving and its relationship to reproduction and health, as well as the possibilities for individually adjusted calving intervals.

Maria Ignatieva:

Sustainable landscape architecture in the era of globalization

Maria Ignatieva is a landscape architect, and in her research she combines knowledge in urban ecology, history of landscape architecture and sustainable design . Her career started with the restoration of baroque parterres of 18th century Peterhof gardens in Russia. Today she is dedicated to the problems of urban biodiversity and design in the era of globalization.

Dirk-Jan de Koning:

Consequences of sequences in animal genetics

DJ de Koning’s research is focused on unraveling the genetic basis of relevant traits in a wide range of livestock species. This is achieved through linking variation at the DNA level with variation at the trait level. An important part of his work has been to develop analytical tools and experimental designs for such studies, as well as a large amount of actual data analysis.

Carl Johan Lagerkvist:

We and our choices: About preferences, economical decisions and motivation

The economic research by Carl Johan Lagerkvist covers a broad area including risk analysis, finance, discrete choice analysis as well as behavioural economics. Areas of application are related to decision-making and economic policy. Economic psychology is used to analyse reasons for human choices, behaviour and decisions.

Lotta Rydhmer:

Breeding for sustainable use of domestic animals

A large part of Lotta Rydhmer’s research and teaching concerns genetic relationships between production traits and traits important for animal health, reproduction and welfare. A sustainable development includes environmental, economic and social aspects. Well-designed breeding programmes are important for achieving a sustainable use of domestic animals. This implies e.g. that sows should be able to produce enough milk for the piglets without loosing too much of its body reserves. Cooperation across disciplines is important when aiming for a more sustainable use of animals.

Birgitta Åhman:

Knowledge and tools for sustainable reindeer husbandry

Birgitta Åhman’s research focuses on reindeer and reindeer husbandry. Initially, a main issue was how reindeer husbandry should deal with radioactive contamination in the environment after the Chernobyl accident. Today she studies reindeer nutrition and welfare, and how management, range use and external disturbances affect production within reindeer husbandry.

Brief introduction of the professors that are to be installed in Alnarp, and their lectures that are to be held held on May 6, 2011.

Erik Andreasson:

Plant protection against stress

Potato late blight is one of the most devastating plant pathogens in Sweden and worldwide. Resistance mechanisms are elucidated partly by identification of proteins and other substances that are involved in the interaction between the potato plant and the oomycete that causes the disease and partly by studies of the infection process with microscopical and molecular methods.

Kristina Blennow:

Handling risk and changing conditions

Kristina Blennow is a physical geographer by training. Her scientific interests lie in the interplay between human beings and their environment, and to through this support planning and decision-making under uncertain and changing conditions. One of her present research interests is to understand how individuals perceive climate change and their options for taking measure to adapt to the changing climate. She employs interdisciplinary strategies with empirical methods and computer simulations, often in international collaboration and in close contact with stakeholders.

Eva Johansson:

Multi-functional crops for the future

Eva Johansson holds a PhD in plant breeding and her research is focused around new and more diverse uses of crops. She investigates food crops and crops that provide raw materials that can replace fossil oil. Of significance is that the plants should be tailor made for the end product for which they will be used, and that the value of the bi-products should be fully exploited.

Birgitta Rämert:

Plant protection in a cropping system perspective

Birgitta Rämert’s research experience concerns management and relationships between crop systems and pest problems in conventional and organic agricultural systems. Her special interest is within the development and performance of biological control strategies and their interaction with cultivation measures.

Tiina Sarap:

Clear concepts determine the form

Tiina Sarap is a landscape architect with a special interest in the early stages of design processes where ideas and concepts are articulated into operative images that can be accepted by the customers or politicians in a dialogue. She has alternated between professional practice in urban development and teaching, where she works experimentally to improve design learning.

Ingrid Sarlöv Herlin:

Border-crossing landscape research in a challenging time

Ingrid Sarlöv Herlin’s research is within landscape planning, a subject that not only crosses the boundaries of a range of neighbouring disciplines, but also involves the many stakeholders who are affected by decision making and landscape changes. As a landscape researcher, she has a wide interest, from landscape ecological planning to European policy, but a particular interest for how landscape planning can adopt a more holistic approach. She also works with methods and tools that can be used to describe and evaluate the landscape and to facilitate communication between experts and users. One such method is landscape characterisation, a systematic way to describe landscape character.

Read about the new professors from 2010 and earlier. In Swedish (mostly) and in English.

• Presentations 2010 (pdf)
• Presentations 2009 (pdf)
• Presentations 2008 (pdf)
• Presentations 2007 (pdf)
• Presentations 2006 (pdf)
• Presentations 2005 (pdf)