Dr. Diana Mihaela Buzas is an accomplished researcher specializing in epigenetics, with extensive experience in academia and international research institutions. Born in Romania, she earned a Bachelor of Engineering in Horticulture from the University of Agronomy and Veterinary Medicine in Bucharest. She later obtained her Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Cell Biology from The University of Queensland, Australia, which laid the foundation for her distinguished career in plant molecular research.

Dr. Buzas began her research career in Romania, contributing to projects at the University of Agronomy and Veterinary Medicine Cluj Napoca and the Romanian Academy’s Institutes of Genetics and Biochemistry. She then gained extensive international research experience through three postdoctoral fellowships (2006-2014) at leading institutions: CSIRO (Australia), the Nara Institute of Science and Technology (Japan), and the Nagahama Institute of Bio-Science and Technology (Japan). After these fellowships, she held an assistant professorship at the Kihara Institute for Biological Research, Yokohama City University. Since 2015, she has been an associate professor at the University of Tsukuba.

Dr. Buzas’s research focuses on the epigenetic mechanisms underlying cellular memory, including parent-of-origin and seasonal memory in plants, particularly the roles of DNA demethylation and Polycomb/Trithorax-derived chromatin modifications. She has led research projects to decipher the rules of epigenetics in phenomena such as winter memory, with applications in breeding late-blooming Brassicaceae crops. Her notable work includes early studies on atmospheric nitrogen fixation in legumes, research on the epigenetic role of the iron-sulfur biogenesis pathway in plants, and work on chromatin-mediated cellular memory in response to actual environmental conditions. Her research has been published in Science, PNAS, Nature Communications, and BMC Genomics, highlighting its significance in molecular biology. Dr. Buzas’s contributions have been recognized, including a JSPS Postdoctoral Fellowship at NAIST (2009–2011) and the Best Paper Special Recognition Award from the Genetics Society of Japan (2012).

In addition to her research, Dr. Buzas contributes to the scientific community as a reviewer for leading journals such as The Plant Cell, Scientific Reports, and New Phytologist, and as an associate editor for Frontiers in Plant Science. She has played a key role in fostering international collaborations, including organizing plant epigenetics international symposia in Japan to bring experts together and tackle emerging research challenges. At the University of Tsukuba, she directs courses on Contemporary Concepts of Inheritance, Global Food Security, and Intercultural Communications. A culture learning enthusiast, she believes in leveraging cultural differences as creative and powerful tools to solve personal dilemmas. Her lifelong passion for collecting rare cacti, which first sparked her interest in biology, continues to this day, giving her a unique appreciation for the enduring nature of perennial plants.

At ICMB2025, she hopes to further strengthen ties between the Japanese and Romanian research communities.