Mohammad Javad Haghighatnia, PhD student

In collaboration with Antonin Machac

I was born and raised in a small family in the south part of Iran, Borazjan. Growing in hot and dry mountains inspired me to challenge the way we looked at life, reaching me at a point to say, “Ecology and Evolutionary Biology is the best way to acknowledge that nature can do everything by itself, without any supernatural powers.” The Plant Repro Evo Lab awards me an ample opportunity to continue my studies as a Ph.D. student in the lovely Prague, investigating how sexual selection drives speciation and whether sexual traits translate into large-scale speciation in Plants. Apart from the science, I go hiking, running, and MTB biking regularly, and recently started downhill skiing! (used to be a Mountaineer :) ). Anyway, when I am not doing crazy sports, I play guitar, sketch animals, and write poems. If you do not get enough, feel free to check out my website (Link)

Markéta Pilneyová, PhD student

I´m interested in plant evolution and biogeography especially in connection with whole genome duplication. Currently I´m studying mixed-ploidy population dynamics in several Central Europe species finishing my master studies. I will continue investigating polyploidy in association with gynodioecy in Stellaria graminea during PhD studies.

Eliška Krtilová, Master student

I am in the second year of bachelor’s studies of Environmental protection at Charles University in Prague. As a subject of my bachelor work I wanted to do something more connected to botany so the theme of the work is ploidy and sexuallity of Stellaria graminae depending on the temperature and season.

I have no experiences in scientific work yet, but I hope it will change soon.

This work is a bit challenging for me in view of the fact that botany was just a small part of my studies so far but I believe it can be a great start of my scientific journey.