LINV AT FIRST GLANCE
The International Laboratory for Plant Neurobiology was founded in 2005 thanks to the generous funding of Ente Cassa di Risparmio di Firenze. LINV is part of the University of Florence and located in the scientific campus of Sesto Fiorentino, Firenze. Thanks to the immediate proximity of LINV to other institutes of biology, chemistry and physics, there is excellent potential for scientific collaboration and the establishment of networks. LINV attracts researchers from all over the world, and it is associated with many institutes to exchange students, ideas and projects. LINV @ Kitakyushu – The laboratory has an affiliated branch in Kitakyushu, Japan. Under the direction of Prof. Tomonori Kawano, young researchers work on the effect of light and oxidative stress in plants.
Under the leadership of Stefano Mancuso, young students, post graduate and post-docs study several aspects of behaviour covering electrophysiology, physiology and cell/molecular biology.
One of the main tasks of LINV is training young researchers in modern techniques of plant physiology, plant behaviour, molecular biology, stress physiology and many other research topics.
OUR VIEW OF PLANTS
Plants are dynamic and highly sensitive organisms that actively and competitively forage for limited resources, both above and below ground; they accurately compute their circumstances, use sophisticated cost-benefit analysis, and take defined actions to mitigate and control diverse environmental insults.
Plants are capable of a refined recognition of self and non-self and are territorial in behaviour.
This new view sees plants as information processing organisms with complex communication throughout the individual plant.
Plants are as sophisticated in behaviour as animals but their potential has been masked because it operates on time scales many orders of magnitude less than that operating in animals.
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