CropFit Services

Plant Growth Promotion

• Focus: Assessing a broad array of plant characteristics to investigate the validity of various biostimulation claims and fertiliser properties.
• Assessment Tools: Advanced equipment like multispectral cameras and high-throughput phenotyping systems.
• Trial Scope: Ranging from in vitro to greenhouse and field studies.

Insecticide and Acaricide activity

• Focus: Validating the effectiveness and mode of action of (bio)pesticides against insects and mites.
• Additional Services: Selectivity tests for biological control agents (BCA).
• Target Species: Tests performed on a variety of agriculturally significant pests.

Fungicidal and Bactericidal activity

• Focus: Validating the effectiveness and mode of action of (bio)pesticides against fungi, bacteria and oomycetes.
• Collections: Pathogens from temperate, subtropical, and tropical climates.
• Assessment tools: Utilising multispectral and hyperspectral cameras for efficiency tests on significant crops.

Nematicide activity and ISR

• Focus: Assessing direct effects of bionematicides and induced systemic resistance (ISR).
• Target Pests: Besides root-knot nematodes, ISR is tested in various insects, mites, and phytopathogens.
• Crop Range: Covering various important broadacre and vegetable crops.

Biostimulant and Biopesticide MoA Testing

• Selectivity and resistance risk testing.
• Mutant panels available for insects, plants and bacteria. 

Plant Biotechnology

• Translating genome-editing tech into a practical crop improvement pipeline.
• Tools: transcriptomics, bulk segregant analysis, GWAS, CRISPR.
• Improved plant transformation and regeneration.

Professor Kris Audenaert- Scientific director

(bio)fungicides, (bio)bactericides, phenotyping platform, multispectral cameras, biostimulants, (bio)fungicide mode of action, (bio)fungicide efficiency, high-throughput phenotyping, greenhouse trials

Professor Monica Höfte

(bio)fungicides, (bio)bactericides, fungal strain collection, (bio)fungicide efficiency

Professor Thomas Van Leeuwen

spider mites, insects, insecticide mode of action, insecticide efficiency, ISR, insecticide selectivity, acaricide

Professor Stefaan Werbrouck 

biostimulants, phytotoxicity, plant micropropagation, plant regeneration 

Professor Tina Kyndt

(bio)nematicides, ISR, nematicide efficiency, crop mutant collections

Professor Inge Verstraeten

root development and adaptation, plant hormones and signalling, rhizosphere nutrient conditions, sustainable crop production

Professor Laurens Pauwels

gene target identification, functional validation of plant traits, crop trait screening, and translating molecular insights to crop performance

Professor Steven Maenhout

Shortening breeding cycles, screening and selection of elite lines, validation of new traits under controlled conditions, integration of genomics into breeding pipelines, and optimisation of breeding programs