Dr Torda Varga is a biologist specialising in fungal evolution and ecology, with a particular focus on mushroom-forming fungi. His research examines their morphological and taxonomic diversity and the evolutionary processes that generate this diversity. Through taxonomically balanced genome sampling and innovative methods that integrate fossil data into molecular dating, he seeks to identify the key drivers of fungal diversification.
During his undergraduate studies, Dr Varga investigated truffle taxonomy and the eco-physiology of truffle orchards in Hungary. His PhD research explored the macro-evolution of mushroom-forming fungi, demonstrating how fruiting body evolution has contributed to speciation.
Dr Varga’s current work at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew combines high-quality modern genomes with those reconstructed from historical specimens, drawing extensively on Kew’s fungal collections. In a two-year postdoctoral project, he developed protocols for assembling genomes from centuries-old material—an important methodological advance that informs much of his ongoing research. As a Research Fellow, he has also launched a new project on fungal hyphal-cord development and supervises several NERC-funded PhD projects.
Although an early-career researcher, Dr Varga has worked at five institutes across four countries, supervised seven undergraduate and graduate research projects, and authored 26 scientific papers in leading journals, including Nature Ecology & Evolution, PNAS, Nature Communications, and New Phytologist.
