Umea University (UMU Umea, Sweden)
Web: www.emg.umu.se

Organisation and Competences: Umeå university was founded in 1965 and is Sweden's fifth oldest university. The total number of employed researchers is around 2400 and the current enrollment of students (including postgraduate students) is more than 36000. Umeå university is also one of two hosts for Umeå Plant Science Centre (UPSC), a centre of experimental plant biology located in Umeå.The UMU part of UPSC consists the Department of Plant Physiology.This environment provides an excellent scientific environment combining competence in plant biology.

Role: Coordination of WP1 and WP3 (sub-task 3.2), and participation in WP6

Staff members' profile:
Dr. Pär K. Ingvarsson- leads a research group that focuses on population and comparative genomics of forest trees. A large part of the work in the research group centers on comparative genomics and the lab is engaged in two ongoing genome projects on forest trees, the European aspen (Populus tremula) and the Norway spruce (Picea abies) genome projects. The Norway spruce genome project has the objective to perform complete genome sequencing of one genotype of the Swedish spruce breeding program, obtain information about expression profiles of genes across different tissues, determine the function of subset of these genes, identify genes responsible for natural variation of ecologically and economically important traits and provide markers for efficient breeding of superior spruce genotypes for the Swedish forestry. The project is coordinated by Pär Ingvarsson and includes a total of 8 PIs from Umeå University, SLU and SciLifeLab in Stockholm.