Biography
Naomi received a BSc in Plant Biology from University of California, Davis (USA) and a PhD in Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology from Yale University (New Haven, CT, USA), both focusing on the molecular mechanisms of plant development. Wanting to know more about the forms and construction of plant architecture bottom-up, she expanded into biomechanics and mechanobiology as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Bern (Switzerland) and then the Ecole Normale Superieure de Lyon (France). In 2013 Naomi started the Biological Form and Function Laboratory at the University of Edinburgh (UK), first as a Chancellor's Fellow and then a Royal Society University Research Fellow. The laboratory moved to the Bioengineering Department of Imperial College London (UK) in 2019. in 2024 she took up a post as Professor of the Biological Design Unit at Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST), Japan. Naomi studies the construction, function, and evolution of plant cells and organs, which are highly adaptable to the changing environment. She explores the form-function-environment landscape to uncover the underlying design principles, creating gradients of biological forms (and their mimics) by fabrication and reprograming of biological development. Ultimately, she weaves the different threads of investigations in developmental and evolutionary biology, mechanics (solid and fluid), and synthetic biology to predict how plant morphology and anatomy may evolve in the future climate.
Naomi is an Editor for New Phytologist where she joined the Editorial board in 2019.