Van is the lead of the Plant Pathology and Host Plant Resistance Group. Her group works on multiple bacterial, fungal, and viral diseases of rice and aims to discover new resistance genes for improving the rice plant’s ability to withstand devastating diseases.

Before joining IRRI, she led the Rice Team Group at the University of Düsseldorf where she focused on the interaction between rice and the bacterial blight pathogen and developing advanced genome editing platforms for rice. Van earned her PhD from the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology in Germany where she studied different layers of plant defense against fungal pathogens ranging from defensive genes to phytohormone signaling, the production of antifungal secondary metabolites, and the association of beneficial microbes.

Van also has a master's degree in molecular bioscience from the University of Heidelberg in Germany and a diploma in biotechnology from Vietnam National University of Agriculture.