Christian Hardtke

Christian Hardtke obtained a Ph.D. in Developmental Biology from the Ludwig-Maximilians University of Munich in 1997, for his work on plant embryogenesis. He then moved to Yale University as Human Frontier Science Program fellow to study photomorphogenesis. Eventually he joined McGill University as Assistant Professor to start his own lab in 2001. He was appointed Associate Professor at the University of Lausanne in 2004, where he became Full Professor in 2010 and directed the Department of Plant Molecular Biology from 2009 to 2017. His research revolves around the molecular genetic control of plant development, with a focus on quantitative aspects of plant growth and morphology. He is particularly interested in mechanisms of vascular tissue differentiation and their relation to root system architecture. His lab mostly investigates the dicotyledon model system Arabidopsis thaliana, but also the monocotyledon model, Brachypodium distachyon.