Sociology of Development group research projects
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Using rapeseed and sunflower meal as novel ingredients
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What do teachers learn during the innovation of their courses?
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Structured materials into functional fractions
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Biomechanics of adhesion in wet and structured environments
- A daunting challenge for technology is gripping in complex environments, such as the inside of the human body or crop fields in agriculture. These environments consist of soft tissues, thin membranes, brittle bones, textured surfaces, and non-Newtonian fluids, whose physical properties differ significantly from the materials traditionally encountered in engineering applications. However, through millions of years of evolution and adaptation, biological organisms have developed a variety of grippers that successfully interface with such complex materials. In this research, we aim to uncover the physical working principles underlying biological gripping, with a particular focus on ‘smooth’ and non-fibrous grippers. -
Call for partners: Enlarge the application scope of functionalised fatty acids
- Wageningen Food & Biobased Research has previously created new technology (WO2016/151115 A1) for a one pot process to enzymatically convert commodity oils and fatty acids into monohydroxylated fatty acids and estolides. The hydroxy fatty acids obtained are further converted to estolides using a second enzymatic step involving lipase-catalysed polymerisation. Ideally, these two steps are combined in a single reaction vessel to eliminate intermediate downstream processing. Wageningen Food & Biobased Research is welcoming partners to join this shared research development. -
How does the evolution of placentation influence the mechanisms which drive transgenerational phenotypic plasticity?
- The placenta is a complex organ which functions as the sole communicative barrier between a mother and her child during pregnancy. Despite having evolved many times over the course of evolutionary history, the origin of placentation is difficult to study in traditional placental species (such as ourselves and other mammals) because transitional species for the mammalian placenta have been lost to extinction. For this reason, our research focuses instead on the live-bearing fish family Poeciliidae, where placentation has independently evolved ~8 times, creating a range of closely-related species which exemplify a gradient from low to high placental complexity. From an evolutionary perspective, these gradations of form in the poecilid placenta allows for analyses of essentially transitional species, helping to unravel how placentation evolved. Moreover, this unique phenomenon not only allows for investigation into the origins of placentation in poecilids, but also provides insight into how placentas of varying complexity can influence offspring development in closely related species. -
Functional advantage of the Placenta and Superfetation in Live-bearing Fish
- Adaptation requires a phenotypic change due to selection that can be passed on to the offspring. Exploring selective forces and the evolutionary potential of traits, therefore, is fundamental to understand how the diversity of traits evolve and hence address a key challenge in evolutionary biology. -
Does the placenta drive the evolution of sexual selection?
- Now, during my PhD I will focus on the question: what are the consequences of the evolution of a complex trait, the placenta, on sexual selection in the live-bearing fish family Poeciliidae? -
Project: Biological models for soft robots
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Visual system of bumblebees
- We study the visual system of bumblebees. How do bumblebees depend on their visual system to perform well controlled landings?