Ulrike Bechtold

Dr. Ulrike Bechtold is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biosciences at Durham University, specializing in plant stress responses, particularly drought and heat stress signaling. Her research integrates transcriptional regulation, post-translational modifications, comparative genomics, and evolutionary biology to understand plant adaptation mechanisms. She has held academic positions since 2011, including at the University of Essex, and has secured funding from organizations like the Leverhulme Trust, BBSRC, and the EU.

• PhD from John Innes Centre (Norwich, UK), focusing on PEPTIDE METHIONINE SULFOXIDE REDUCTASE gene family.
• Postdoctoral work at University of Essex and University of Utrecht (EMBO fellowship).

Research interests include:

• Transcriptional and post-translational control of stress responses
• Evolutionary origins of drought tolerance in plants
• Integration of growth and stress signaling pathways

Key grants include:

• Leverhulme Trust (2019): £237k for protein synthesis regulation under stress.
• BBSRC Newton Fund (2018): £196k for stress tolerance in mustard rape.

Her lab developed water-use proxy traits for drought response studies in Brassica crops. Current projects focus on genomic innovations enabling plant terrestrialization.

Professional roles include:

• Committee member, Society of Biochemistry (2018–2022).
• Member, French National Research Council’s Animal, Microbial and Plant Biology Panel (2017–2019).