At the ceremony last Friday, SLU's vice chancellor Maria Knutson (left) officially inaugurated Totte Niittylä (right) as professor at SLU (photo: Jenny Svennås-Gillner, SLU).
Last week, Totte Niittylä was officially inaugurated as Professor of Plant Physiology at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU). The inauguration ceremony took place on May 8 and 9 at SLU’s Ultuna campus in Uppsala. It was part of the university’s annual academic celebration welcoming new professors.
The professorial inauguration is a long-standing academic tradition at SLU, combining popular science lectures with a formal ceremony. This year, ten new professors from different SLU departments and faculties were honoured, including Totte Niittylä from UPSC. The event included two days of public lectures, where each professor presented their research to colleagues, students, and invited guests. The following ceremony was hosted by SLU’s Vice-Chancellor and concluded with a celebratory dinner for the newly inaugurated professors and their guests.
Totte Niittylä joint UPSC as group leader in 2009 and was appointed professor at SLU in October 2024. His research group studies how carbon is taken up from the atmosphere and used by trees to form wood. By combining genomics, metabolomics, and advanced modelling, Totte Niittylä and his team aim to identify key genes and enzymes that regulate carbon transport in trees. Their long-term goal is to develop genetic tools to enhance carbon capture and storage in forest biomass. Totte Niittylä presented his lecture, titled “Following the carbon – from the atmosphere to wood”, on Thursday afternoon on the 8th of May.
The Heads of the two departments that are forming UPSC, Totte Niittylä (SLU, left) and Johannes Hanson (Umeå University, right), are celebrating together during the inauguration ceremony (photo: Jenny Svennås-Gillner, SLU).
More information:
More information about Totte Niittylä's research including a video presentation on the SLU homepage
More information about Totte Niittylä's research on the UPSC homepage