University of Wisconsin–Madison
Simon Gilroy

Simon Gilroy

Professor

sgilroy@wisc.edu

608-262-4009

Birge Hall

Lab Page

Simon Gilroy

Research

Cell Biology, Plant Behavior

Google Scholar

Research in the Gilroy Lab seeks to uncover the cellular and molecular mechanisms that enable plants to sense and respond to environmental stresses. Our work spans questions ranging from how plants detect and react to insect herbivory to how they cope with flooding and other challenging conditions. A particular focus of our research is the space environment, where we investigate how plants and microbes respond to factors such as the reduced gravity of the International Space Station, the increased radiation exposure of deep space, and the unique physical and chemical environments of the rocky substrates at the surfaces of the Moon and Mars.

An image of a plant with certain parts of it's leaves fluoresced red.
Arabidopsis plant engineered to show the rapid, plant-wide spread of a calcium signal triggered by wounding of a single leaf.
An image with two images digitally joined together. The image on the left is of a satellite in space above Earth with the moon in the background. On the right, a plant grows in a small plastic container.
Cotton plants growing on the International Space Station in custom designed growth chambers as part of the Gilroy Lab’s TICTOC project.

Education

PhD, Plant Biochemistry, University of Edinburgh, 1987
BA/MA (cantab), Botany, University of Cambridge, 1984