Meet our Principal Investigators
Faculty Labs
TPSC affiliated faculty represent 3 colleges and 6 academic departments on campus.
Our growing community collaborates in unique ways to support sustainable production of food, feed, and biomaterial issues by improving yield, disease resistance, adaptation to a changing environment, plant metabolism, and metabolic engineering.
Together we teach the next generation of plant scientists, engage stakeholders, and facilitate cutting edge science to sustain and improve agricultural productivity.
Areas of Research
- Environmental Microbiology
- Water and Soil Quality
Areas of Research
Fundamental and translational studies towards crop improvement through genome-editing and tissue-culture
Areas of Research
Invasive plant ecology, biofuel ecology, allelopathy, risk assessment, weed science
Eric Beers
Professor
Associate Director for Graduate Programs
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
Areas of Research
Plant development and functional genomics
Areas of Research
Genomics of tree development, ecophysiology and adaptation; molecular genetics of tree maturation, flowering and crown architecture; epigenetic mechanisms and small RNAs in trees; long-distance signaling in trees.
Areas of Research
Regulation of metabolism during seed filling and seed metabolic engineering, multi-omics approaches, plant metabolic engineering
Areas of Research
- Evolutionary ecological genomics
- Genetics in plant defense and physiology
Areas of Research
Population and evolutionary genomics, genome-enabled breeding, evolutionary ecology
Areas of Research
- Plant specialized metabolism
- Poison ivy urushiol metabolism and chemical ecology
Areas of Research
- Phytochemical content of fruits and legumes
- Increasing iron bioavailability of legume grains
Areas of Research
- Plant-pathogen interactions
Sasha Marine
Collegiate Assistant Professor
Director of VT-Research, Extension and Learning Program
Department of Biochemistry
Areas of Research
Dr. Marine is the program coordinator for VT-REEL, a 10-week summer undergraduate research program focused on translational plant science and food security, with research projects shared between on-campus labs and ARECs.
Areas of Research
Dr. Morota investigates the genome–phenome relationship using statistical and quantitative genetics and its application to plant breeding.
Areas of Research
- Regulation of amino acid transport and metabolism in Arabidopsis
- Determinants of seed protein content in soybean
Areas of Research
- Genomics
- Crop Improvement
Areas of Research
- SmartFarm Innovation Network™ : SmartTechnologies for Crop and the Green Industries
- Data Analytics, Decisions, and Machine Learning for Food, Agriculture, Communities, and Health Systems
- Precision agriculture technologies
Areas of Research
Bacterial motility and chemotaxis; sensing of environmental signals, two-component signal transduction, the speed-variable flagellar motor, flagellotropic phage infection, function of type IV pili in symbiosis, tumor-targeting Salmonella
Areas of Research
- Airborne plant pathogens and ice-nucleating microbes; mycotoxins
Areas of Research
Bacterial-host interactions; cell-cell communication; molecular microbiology; emphasis on bacterial environmental sensing and gene regulation, including quorum sensing; virulence of the corn pathogen Pantoea stewartii and the human foodborne pathogen Vibrio parahaemolyticus; beneficial roles of bacteria in aquaculture
Areas of Research
- Biology
- Functional Genomics
- Biochemistry of Chemical Communication
Areas of Research
Biochemical and molecular mechanisms of chemical defense fitness in higher plants
Areas of Research
- Genome-based classification and identification of plant pathogens and biocontrol agents
- Biological ice nucleation activity
Areas of Research
- Viral replication mechanisms and virus-host interactions of positive-strand RNA viruses
Areas of Research
- Flavonoid production in stressed potatoes
- Pine drought stress
- Orchid mycorrihizal relations
Areas of Research
- Parasitic plants
- Plant communication
- Weed evolution
Susan Whitehead
Associate Professor of Biological Sciences
Department of Biological Sciences
Plant evolutionary responses to multi-species interactions; chemical ecology of seed dispersal and fruit defense; domestication and plant defense; agricultural applications of chemical ecology
Areas of Research
- Microbial ecology
- Plant growth promotion
- Rhizobium spp.
- Mycorrhizae
- Land management
- Natural ecosystems
Areas of Research
Characterization of the architecture and localization of the Arabidopsis flavonoid enzyme complex using a variety of molecular, biochemical, and cell biological techniques
Areas of Research
Plant development, hormone signaling, genetic engineering of yield/resistance/added-value crop traits, genetic variation, protein engineering, biosensors, directed evolution, and synthetic biology
Areas of Research
- Plant Pathology
- Host-microbe interactions
- Data science
Areas of Research
- Soybean breeding
- Crop genetics
Areas of Research
- Molecular Plant-Microbe Interactions
- Plant Biotechnology
- Controlled-Environment Agriculture
Contact our Program Coordinator or faculty to inquire about studying with our program!