In 2014, together with 2 colleagues at this time -Dr. Magdalena Mazur & Dr. Sarah Schmidt- I organized a charity sale of in vitro Arabidopsis plants. The money we collected was donated to Doctors without borders.

What is Arabidopsis?

Arabidopsis’ common name is thale cress. It is the smallest member of the mustard family of plants (like cabbage, radish, broccoli and Brussels sprouts). Arabidopsis is a model organism for plant research.

How does it work?

All the nutrients and water that the plant needs to grow are in the jelly medium. This is how we routinely grow plants in a laboratory.  This way of growing your plant is called in vitro. Your little plant without borders only needs light to grow and be happy.

Why is Arabidopsis a plant without borders?

Arabidopsis grows in all temperate countries, but not in extreme climate areas (North and South poles, tropic countries, deserts). Like inhabitants of different countries, every geographical subgroup of Arabidopsis has different shapes and sizes due to the various climate, weather and nutrient conditions that the plants face. We selected 5 nationalities to observe similarities and differences !

On the left: some of the many shapes of Arabidopsis
On the right: the five original locations of the Arabidopsis plants we selected