Melissa Mai

In general, plants cannot physically run away from their problems, so they must be able to tolerate whatever their environment throws at them. I study how plants couple fluid transport with the management of solutes they need to retain or remove in order to adapt to potentially hostile environments. In particular, I am interested in the biophysical underpinnings of salt, sugar, and methane transport in plants. Primarily rooted in theoretical and computational approaches but also supported by greenhouse, lab, and field work, my research not only spans different length scales, from cell to tissue to whole-plant physiology, but also ecological contexts, from deserts to alpine regions to wetlands.