Dr. Walter Schröder

ICG-3, Forschungsbereich Transport-Dynamik

Schröder, Walter, Dr. Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH ICG-3: Phytosphäre 52425 Jülich Tel. : +49 2461 61 4411 Fax : +49 2461 61 2492 w.schroeder@fz-juelich.de

Transport processes are among the very basic requirements for live. Therefore it does not come with much surprise, that during evolution elaborate systems for regulated and well controlled transport were developed on all relevant organizational levels ranging from the molecular, cellular, tissue and whole plant level. This applies to both, plant internal transport as well as exchange of material between pants and their environment.

My personal interest focuses on structure-function relations of long range transport, especially on the uptake of nutrients by roots, their transfer to and within the long-range transport system XYLEM as well as the unloading from this system into local sinks and into the corresponding transport system PHLOEM. Being a biophysicist, structural and functional aspects and their correlations are my favorite aspects of the truly multifaceted topic.

The experimental approach involves the use of tracers, preferentially stable isotope traces, to monitor the path of selected materials on all organizational levels. In the past I was involved in the development and improvement of several analytical microbeam techniques and the required specimen preparation protocols. The aim of this approach is to facilitate experiments on the whole plant level and then to zoom in onto the tissue and cellular level.

The most visual impression of the analytical microbeam techniques used to study transport of material on the tissue level can be given by examples from SIMS (secondary ion mass spectroscopy) and XFEMT (x-ray fluorescence microbeam tomography).

Top panels: SIMS images of potassium, calcium and magnesium, showing a cross section of a twig.
Bottom panels: XFEMT "virtual sections" of mycorrhyzal root of tomato plant, grown on heavy metal polluted soil. Total absorption and zink as well as lead distributions are shown.

Publikationen

Publikationen