Prof. Ted Turlings

Prof. Ted Turlings

Prof. Ted Turlings is a national of The Netherlands, but has lived and worked most of his adult life in Switzerland. He is a chemical ecologist with a specific interest in plant-insect interactions. He is full professor at the University of Neuchâtel where he heads the research laboratory of Fundamental and Applied Research in Chemical Ecology (FARCE). After his biology studies at Leiden University (The Netherlands) he obtained his PhD at the University of Florida, and then moved to Switzerland, first to the ETH Zürich and eventually to the University of Neuchâtel.

From 2008-2013, Prof. Turlings was the director of the National Centre of Competence in Research Plant Survival, and currently he directs the Centre of Competence in Chemical Ecology (C3E) at the University of Neuchâtel (https://www.unine.ch/centres-of-excellence/home/ecologie-chimique.html). As a founding co-director of the Swiss Plant Science Web he established the Neuchâtel Platform for Analytical Chemistry.  He is involved in coordination and evaluation activities of the Swiss National Science Foundation and the Swiss Academy of Sciences.

His current research is devoted to applying novel knowledge on chemically-mediated interactions among plants and insects for the development of sustainable pest control strategies. These efforts are extended to his teaching commitments, which focuses on chemical ecology and sustainable agriculture. He established the Interuniversity Doctoral Program in Organismal Biology, which he directed from 2001 until 2017. He is also the founding co-director of a Masters of Advanced Studies (MAS) in Integrated Crop Management, which was launched in 2014 in collaboration with CABI-Switzerland. This program is devoted to the education of advanced students from developing countries.

In the context of his research, Ted Turlings coordinates strong collaborative international projects that, among others, involve scientists in China, the USA, Africa, Mexico and throughout Europe. His contacts with national and international research organizations, as well as agro-industries put him in a unique position to unify often opposing parties in a joint effort to fight crop pests and pathogens in an environmentally sound manner without compromising crop yields.