Curriculum vitae
Name: Rients Engelhard NIKS
Department of Plant Breeding
PO Box 386
6700 AJ Wageningen
The Netherlands
tel +31 317 482508
fax +31 317 483457
e-mail: rients.niks@wur.nl
Date/place of birth: 22 november 1953, Grijpskerk, The Netherlands
Nationality: Dutch
Sex: Male
Marital status: Married
Education:
1966 – 1972
1972 – 1978
1978 – 1981
Gymnasium-B at Harderwijk
Study Plant Breeding at the Wageningen Agricultural University (MScdegree obtained with highest distinction)
major:
Plant Breeding
minors:
Cytogenetics
Phytopathology
Simulation models
PhD thesis work at the Laboratory of Plant Breeding, Wageningen
Agricultural University:
Thesis: “Studies on the histology of partial resistance in barley to leaf
rust, Puccinia hordei”
1981 – 1983
Worked as post doc fellow in the durum wheat improvement
programme of the International Center for Agricultural Research in the
Dry Areas (ICARDA), Syria
1984 – present
Assistant Professor at the Laboratory of Plant Breeding, Wageningen
Agricultural University.
Teaching: Responsible since 1986 for teaching courses on “Breeding
for resistance to biotic stress factors”.
Other tasks are to co-ordinate and teach in several practicals and
courses on various subjects related to plant breeding in English, Dutch
or Spanish.
Organized and taught in many Plant Breeding courses in South
America, Kenya, China and Thailand.
Invited lecturer in PhD course in Pietermaritzburg, South-Africa (2010).
Visiting professor at Tehran University, Iran (since 2010).
Research: The research focuses on durable, non-hypersensitive types
of resistance of plants to specialised pathogen species. As model
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system serves barley (Hordeum vulgare) and barley leaf rust (Puccinia
hordei). The resistances that are focused on are “partial resistance”
and “non-host resistance”.
Recently, the research advanced towards positional cloning of genes
that are responsible for the two kinds of resistance. See for a link to my
publication list (over 80 publications in ISI journals)
http://www.wewur.wur.nl/popups/vcard.aspx?id=NIKS001&lang=nl
and for more personal details my LinkedIn profile (recently made):
http://www.linkedin.com/myprofile?trk=hb_tab_pro
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Techniques and approaches:
The research of the group strongly relies on the following techniques
and assets:
Molecular marker technology (mostly AFLP, but also other types of
markers)
Map construction, based on JoinMap software (the author of that
software, Prof Stam, is a recently retired staff member of the
Laboratory).
QTL mapping, based on MapQTL
A large collection of Puccinia rust isolates and species
Two pooled BAC libraries of strategic barley lines
Disease tests to assess levels of resistance, mostly in a quantitative
way. This evaluation includes microscopy in order to characterise the
mechanism of plant defence.
Languages: Dutch (native speaker); English (fluent), Spanish (near-fluent), French,
German, Arabic (all for simple conversations)
PhD studied that were supervised (as first responsible)
Name (year)
Subject
D. Rubiales Olmedo (1991) Base genetica de la Resistencia del Tritordeo (
Tritordeum) a enfermedades de trigo (Triticum aestivum y
T. turgidum) y cebada (Hordeum vulgare)" University of
Córdoba, Spain.
C.A. Swertz (1994)
Morphology of germlings of urediniospores and its value for
the identification of grass rust fungi
C.C. Anker (2001)
Prehaustorial and posthaustorial resistance to wheat leaf
rust in diploid wheat
M.C. Vaz Patto (2001)
The genetics and mechanism of avoidance of rust infection
in Hordeum chilense
F. Martínez Moreno (2002) Mecanismos de resistencia a roya de la hoja en trigo y
cebada. University of Córdoba, Spain.
H. Jafary (2006)
The genetic basis of non-host resistance of barley to
specialised fungal pathogens, sponsored by the Ministry of
Science, Research, Science & Technology, Iran.
Th. Marcel (2007)
Genetic architecture of basal resistance of barley to
Puccinia hordei
R. Aghnoum (2009)
Basal resistance of barley to adapted and non-adapted
forms of Blumeria graminis
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Several other PhD students were co-supervised.
Present PhD projects:
(since September 2009) Freddy Yeo Kuok San: “Cloning and confirmation of barley
sequences that determine basal resistance of barley to specialized Puccinia rust fungi”
sponsored by the Malaysian Government.
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