Group Leader Tropical Botany

Naturalis Biodiversity Center in Leiden is the Dutch national research institute for biodiversity and systematics. With our collection of 43 million specimens, one of the world's largest natural history collections, and our state-of-the-art research facilities we offer the (inter)national research infrastructure for species, identification and monitoring (for example in  ARISE  and DiSSCo  ). We closely collaborate with many Dutch universities, research institutes, industry, and government. We host over 120 researchers including 16 academia embedded professors and 50 PhD students. We present the history of our planet, and the diversity of life on Earth, through permanent and temporary museum exhibitions, educational programmes, and online presence, with more than 400,000 visitors per year. All in all, a unique combination of science and culture in the Netherlands and elsewhere in the world!

Biodiversity drives the fundamental ecosystem processes that we depend on. Biodiversity is a multidisciplinary and multi stakeholder topic. So we do not cover all biodiversity research ourselves. Naturalis is about species. About discovering and identifying species. About the evolution, the interaction and monitoring of species. We combine our knowledge of species with promising novel technologies such as metagenomics, artificial intelligence, data science and 3D imaging. 

We aim to accelerate the discovery of species and their interactions in ecosystems. For this, we create exciting new multidisciplinary lines of research and we train scientists, students and experts to become world-leading in this new frontier of research. 

Ever since the 16th century, taxonomists have been naming and describing the plants, animals, fungi and microorganisms that share our planet today and in the past. Although about 2 million species are now known, research suggests there are at least 10 and probably more than 20 million species on Earth, meaning that 80-90% of our world’s biodiversity is still undiscovered! At the same time, we are witnessing alarming biodiversity declines. Reports indicate that 1 million species are currently threatened with extinction. It is increasingly recognized that biodiversity loss is one of the most significant threats to the environment and to our ability to transition to a sustainable future. These circumstances call for transformational scientific progress and serious action. We believe that we, as Naturalis, can play an important role in this transformation by: 

• Fostering excellence in science and innovation in the field of biology and earth sciences 
• Training scientists, students and experts to provide sustainable capacity building in the field of taxonomy
• Providing a vibrant scientific environment for early-stage and mid-career researchers and foster their academic career
• Providing and maintaining a sustainable state-of-the-art (inter)national research infrastructure
• Further supporting and strengthening the national research community in the field of biology
• Further developing an extensive (inter)national network that connects academia, society, government, industry and the general public

• Extending our outreach to the general public by not only focussing on our visitors, but also by engaging with new audiences outside the museum, and by using citizen science
• Expanding our role in Dutch national science policy by calling for an ambitious biodiversity strategy in societal and political agendas. 

Find out more  about our research, labs and collection.