Trainee Seed Quality Research (6 months)

Into ActionThe colleagues from the Research department carry out highly specialized and innovative research to support breeding and seed production. With the use of high-tech, new varieties of flower crops are developed for multiple characteristics, seed quality being one of them. The Seed Production Research team, develops and improves seed production and germination protocols in order to obtain high quality seeds of our flower crops. The ChallengeAlthough processes are in place to achieve high quality of seed batches, there are multiple cases where the cause for poor seed quality is not yet known. There are many factors that affect seed quality, production conditions being one of them, but also the appearance of the seed and pollen quality. Studying and understanding different seed and plant characteristics and the effects of these on seed quality is relevant for breeders and seed producers. During your internship you will be responsible for conducting trials in the glasshouse and experiments in the laboratory to determine differences of these parameters on multiple crops, and investigate whether a correlation exists with seed quality and yield. Moreover, you will also be in charge of testing different environmental factors that affect the physiology of the seeds in order for these to germinate. You will work together with your supervisor.