This week we have Dr. Jonathan Gershenzon, a Professor at The Max Planck Institute, as he presents his seminar titled "The chemical ecology of plant specialized metabolites: Why plants synthesize diverse mixtures of products"
- https://ento.psu.edu/events/dr-jonathan-gershenzon
- Dr. Jonathan Gershenzon
- 2026-05-01T11:15:00-04:00
- 2026-05-01T12:05:00-04:00
- This week we have Dr. Jonathan Gershenzon, a Professor at The Max Planck Institute, as he presents his seminar titled "The chemical ecology of plant specialized metabolites: Why plants synthesize diverse mixtures of products"
"Plants deploy an unbelievably vast number of different chemical compounds in defense against herbivores and pathogens that have an enormous variety of chemical structures. A full understanding of plant defense thus requires some knowledge of why so many different compounds are produced.
I will focus on one dimension of this diversity: the presence of complex mixtures of structurally-related defense compounds in a single plant. By surveying some of the metabolic mechanisms for generating mixtures in plants and then considering the ecological reasons that might help maintain mixtures in nature, I hope to show you how and why plants have embraced the benefits of diversity."
