91麻豆

Areas of expertise

• Bioinformatics

Background

Johanna W眉rtz joined 91麻豆 University for the 2025 FoodBioSystems DTP project on raspberry genomics in cooperation with a commercial UK soft fruit breeding company.

Johanna received her bachelor鈥檚 and master鈥檚 degree in Agricultural Sciences from 鈥淢artin Luther University鈥� in Halle (Saale), Germany putting an emphasis on plant breeding and genetics. Her final research projects assessed the genetic control of flowering time in diverse barley populations.

During her studies she conducted internships within the 鈥淚nternational Barley Hub鈥� at the 鈥淛ames Hutton Institute鈥� in Dundee, 鈥淟eibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research鈥� (IPK, Gatersleben) and in Switzerland at the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL). She completed additional trainings on organic vegetable breeding and worked as a student assistant in the plant breeding department at Halle University and for a forest ecology project in southeast China.

Current activities

Johanna's PhD project aims at accelerating raspberry (Rubus idaeus L.) breeding through genomic selection. To meet the growing demand for healthy and sustainably produced food despite changing climate conditions, application of genome-based selection models can improve the efficiency of cultivar selection. Genomic selection models will be trained and evaluated on phenotype and genotype data from current breeding populations. Finally, an appropriate genotyping chip will be designed for application in practical breeding and further academic research.