Group photo October 2025, Felix Morsdorf
Macrogarden planting in Effretikon, Meredith C Schuman
Branch harvesting in Allenwiller, Meredith C Schuman
Exposed beech tree in May on Corsica, Meredith C Schuman
Drought timeline, Dave Kurath
Rosalie in La Massane, Alexander Steppke
Grapevine yellows, Meredith C Schuman
Push-pull field sampling, Meredith C Schuman
Scales of investigation, left to right: J. Lang at Effretikon, C. Stefanini at Laegern, DeLeaves sampling tool at Allenwiller, AVIRIS-NG Quicklook over Etna
Spatial Genetics Fall 2025

Spatial Genetics of Ecosystems

Logo by Dr. Sergio E. Ramos Castro

We want to know why living beings vary and where their variation matters for ecology and for people.

Led by Prof. Meredith Schuman, the Spatial Genetics group studies the heritable and environmentally responsive variation of organisms in their environments. Many of our projects focus on plants, among Nature's master chemists and fixers of carbon. We are interested in the consequences of genetic variation for organisms and the ecosystems they form. In many projects, we partner with ecosystem managers including farmers, foresters, and conservationists.

Current projects

We lead projects on the future of forests, oceans, and agro-ecosystems (see Research units) including the project SmartGrape. We co-lead the team Genes from Space including the related ESA project “EO for Genetic Indicators”, and are co-initiators of the Earth Metabolome Initiative. We are work package leaders in UPSCALE and are conducting the NOMIS project Remotely Sensing Ecological Genomics (continued until 2026).

Research units

The Spatial Genetics group hosts three subunits focusing on different research topics.

Plant Ecology and Global Change
Dr. Sofia van Moorsel

The group studies how ecological communities respond to global change, focusing on how diversity within and among species shapes plant stability and functioning. Using experiments and tools from ecology, genomics, and remote sensing, they investigate the future of plant populations in changing environments.

4D Remote Sensing of Forests
Dr. Felix Morsdorf

The group develops and applies remote sensing technologies, including LiDAR, to monitor forest structure, biomass, and health. They create physically based methods and use radiative transfer models to extract detailed, multi-scale information that advances understanding of forest dynamics, biodiversity, and carbon cycling in complex 4D environments.

Landscape and Climate Change Genomics
Dr. Oliver Selmoni

The group studies how global change affects biodiversity by integrating satellite Earth observations with genomic analyses. EO data is used to monitor environmental stressors worldwide and genomics to measure their long-term impacts on wild and domesticated species.