Karel Říha was one of the first group leaders at the Gregor Mendel Institute, joining in 2003. He is now Deputy Director at CEITEC Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic. Karel returned to Vienna for the GMI’s 25th Anniversary Scientific Symposium, which celebrated the institute’s growth from its early days into a leading European center for plant research. In this interview Karel reflects on his time at the GMI and the experience of helping build the institute.

What is it like to be back at the GMI for the 25th anniversary?

It’s wonderful to be back and see how far the institute has come. When I first arrived in 2003, this building didn’t exist yet—it was just a hole in the ground! The institute itself only existed on paper. In the early years, the different research groups were scattered around the city, and it wasn’t until we moved into this building, three years later, that it really felt like an institute. The transformation since then has been amazing, and the GMI is now one of the leading plant research institutes in Europe, with excellent facilities and strong momentum.

You were one of the very first group leaders here. How did that shape your career?

It was my first experience as a group leader, since I was offered the position when I was just 30. In the beginning, it was very much like a university position: We had to secure our own funding and build everything from scratch. But that was also a great opportunity to learn and grow as a group leader.

I was also able to launch my work on telomeres and telomerase in plants, and I shared a lab and resources with Peter Schlögelhofer, which fostered a lot of collaboration. The experience of setting up a lab and shaping the culture of a new institute was something I carried with me and applied later in my career.

What was the focus of your research during your time at the GMI?

I originally came to the GMI to study telomeres and telomerase. Over time, though, my research evolved, influenced by the chromosome biology department here. My group began to shift its focus to exploring meiosis as well. By the time I left, this broader perspective was already shaping the direction of our work and ultimately led to my current research, which I was glad to present at this symposium.

In your view, what makes the GMI special?

What really sets the GMI apart is the environment. It’s a state-of-the-art plant research institute, but it’s embedded in a much broader scientific campus, the Vienna BioCenter. You’re constantly exposed to new ideas and approaches from other fields, not just plant science. That’s very different from being isolated in a plant-only institute somewhere outside the city.

I’ve always seen plants as a model system to study fundamental questions in cell biology, and the interdisciplinary atmosphere at the Vienna BioCenter really supported that kind of research.

What did you take from your GMI experience that you still use today?

Of course, everything we do builds on past experiences. Leading a research group here for 11 years gave me a lot of leadership experience that I’ve continued to use. But perhaps the most unique part of my time here was being involved in creating a new institute from the ground up. That experience—seeing how an institute is built and how its culture develops—was incredibly valuable and has definitely shaped how I approach similar situations today.