Rana Munns is the leading authority on how crop plants adapt to salinity. She has characterised the processes involved over a wide range of scales, from ion transporters in cell membranes, through the traffic of sodium and chloride around the plant, to the consequences of this traffic for the well-being of the plant throughout its life-cycle. Her uniquely comprehensive knowledge of these diverse processes enabled her to devise an exquisitely sensitive technique for identifying salinity tolerant plants. She has used this technique to identify simply-inherited novel genes that are providing great impetus for exploring the molecular genetics of salinity tolerance.