Prof. Willem M. de Vos

Wageningen University, Netherlands

Head of the Laboratory of Microbiology of the Agrotechnology and Food Sciences Group at Wageningen University, research aims to provide fundamental insight in the biotransformations and interactions of microorganisms and to contribute to their exploitation in agro-food, non-food and environmental applications, primarily molecular-oriented, regularly incorporating genomics approaches, and based on the integration of three microbial disciplines, viz. genetics, ecology, and physiology, various biotechnological applications include the use of fungal bioconversions in exploiting agricultural resources, the degradation of environmentally toxic compounds, the anaerobic treatment of waste water, the modification of the gastro-intestinal microflora, and the production and engineering of industrial enzymes. Important research areas include environmental microbiology/microbial physiology, molecular ecology, bacterial genetics and fungal genomics.