
The group has moved to Israel Ocean and Limnology Research
More information will be added in the near future
Photosynthesis
Physiology
Photosynthesis is comprised out of three different sets of reactions tied to the three central scientific fields in life sciences - Physics, Chemistry and Biology. These sets are so intertwined that 90 years of research are not enough and we still find new and surprising facts regarding this mega process. We find these phenomena in all scales- from satellites, through drones and towers, to leaves, chloroplasts, complexes, biological feedback regulation, biochemical pathways, chemical redox reactions, and ultimately excitons and pure physical energy transfer and absorbance. One cannot understand and research the full scope of photosynthesis, and so our group is focused on the physiological pathways related to the utilization of light within the photosynthetic apparatus. We are interested in questions such as: How much light was absorbed within the apparatus ? - during growth, during stress, at various spatial gradients on the plant, etc. What was the amount of energy diverted towards photochemistry and how much of this energy was used eventually in biomass production ? Can we track new phenomena related to light utilization in nature which is not previously documented but is worth to study ?
Tadmor Y, et al. 2021. Plants
When light hits matter, several different reactions may occur. Light passes through the object, absorbed by it and some of it reflects back. The reflection is constructed of two governing phenomena - diffuse and specular light reflection. The difference between the two types depend on the surface light interacts with - diffuse is a mixture of rays scattered from an inhomogeneous, and specular from a flat homogenous surfaces. On top of that, light scattering from a live tissue, such as plant, returns with additional information. This is because plants absorb and reflect parts of the electromagnetic spectrum according to their need - absorbing the visual range for photosynthesis and reflects the near infra-red in order to avoid heat accumulation. This property makes reflectance spectroscopy a tool that can shed a light on internal chemical reactions within the plant. The main challenge is to focus only on the information that matters while cleaning out equipment distortions, environmental as well as meteorological effects and noise coming from the sample. To do that our group implements advanced statistical algorithms that enable the computer to identify and locate only the information that matters. Traditionally reflectance spectroscopy asks question related to the chemical nature of the plant - water content, lipids content, pigments contents etc. Out group asks a central question: is it possible to isolate physically reactions in these spectra? i.e. fluxes, chemical reactions which attenuate in time.
Data Science
Remote
Sensing
Remote Sensing identifies chemical components and object characteristics by using reflectance spectroscopy and adding to it computer vision. It takes a 2D information of reflectance spectra (intensity of light flux reflected back from an object in each spectral wavelength) and cast it over a geographical area, i.e. an image - from microscope, through regular easy to use cameras, and to sophisticated systems mounted on satellites and moving over the earth. Then the 2D information becomes 3D - a data cube where in addition to the object information, there is an additional variance added by the heterogeneity of the area the image is being constructed. The data cube can be generated by hyperspectral imagery - acquisition of spectra per each pixel over a geographical area, and it can also by interpolated by advanced geo-statistical algorithms. Our group is interested in casting our patented indices over geographical areas and then ask questions - How well data was scaled between different levels of information - from single canopy to a whole field ? Can we segment (isolate) key areas within a data cube that contain new and unknown biological/physiological behavior ?

