Faculty
Affiliated Faculty
TPSC affiliated faculty represent 5 colleges and 8 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.
Srdjan Acimovic
Assistant Professor
Virginia Agricultural Research and Extension Centers
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Areas of Research
Plant pathogen biology, ecology; apple and pear fruit trees
Brian Badgley
Associate Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Environmental microbiology; water and soil quality
Areas of Research
Phonemics of currently grown crops with an emphasis on peanuts and future crops
Bastiaan Bargmann
Assistant Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Fundamental and translational studies toward crop improvement through genome-editing and tissue-culture
Amy Brunner
Associate Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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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
Dennis Cladis
Assistant Professor
Department of Food Science and Technology
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Areas of Research
Nutrient phenotyping, polyphenol toxicity, polyphenols in chronic kidney disease
Eva Collakova
Associate Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
Research Gate
Areas of Research
Regulation of metabolism during seed filling and seed metabolic engineering, multi-omics approaches, plant metabolic engineering
Carrie Fearer
Assistant Professor
Department of Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation
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Areas of Research
Forest pathology; bioinformatics; endophytes and the tree microbiome
Maaz Gardezi
Associate Professor
Department of Sociology
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Areas of Research
Precision agriculture; climate adaptation and vulnerability; and policy and governance
David Haak
Associate Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Evolutionary ecological genomics; genetics in plant defense and physiology
Areas of Research
Population and evolutionary genomics, genome-enabled breeding, evolutionary ecology
Allie Igwe
Assistant Professor
Department of Biological Sciences
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Areas of Research
Environmental microbial ecology, plant-microbe interactions, geobiology, and extremophiles
John Jelesko
Associate Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Plant specialized metabolism, poison ivy urushiol metabolism, and chemical ecology
Courtney Leisner
Assistant Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Abiotic stress, physiology, molecular biology, genomics and bioinformatics, and specialized metabolism
Song Li
Associate Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Plant genomics and bioinformatics, machine learning, and high throughput phenotyping
Suyi Li
Associate Professor
Department of Mechanical Engineering
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Areas of Research
Robotics; autonomous and dynamical systems
Marta Lima
Research Assistant Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Phytochemical content of fruits and legumes, and increasing iron bioavailability of legume grains
Areas of Research
Plant-pathogen interactions
Gota Morota
Associate Professor
School of Animal Science
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Areas of Research
Genome–phenome relationship using statistical and quantitative genetics and its application to plant breeding
Guillaume Pilot
Associate Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Regulation of amino acid transport and metabolism in Arabidopsis; and determinants of seed protein content in soybean
Areas of Research
Genomics, and crop improvement
Nicholas Santantonio
Assistant Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Small grains breeding program to produce superior wheat and barley varieties for eastern North America; integrating latest genotyping and phenotyping technologies to accelerate genetic improvement for new and changing environments; and quantitative genetics theory
Birgit Scharf
Professor of Biological Sciences
Department of Biological Sciences
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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
Avoiding frost damage in apple and peach; enhancing annual bearing in apple; evaluation of apple varieties, rootstocks and high-density training systems; improving apple fruit quality and shelf-life of peaches and cherries; efficacy of non-chemical methods to control disease of apple and peach
Dorothea Tholl
Professor of Biological Sciences
Department of Biological Sciences
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Areas of Research
Biology, functional genomics, and biochemistry of chemical communication
Jim Tokuhisa
Assistant Professor of Practice, Biological Sciences
Department of Biological Sciences
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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; and biological ice nucleation activity
Xiaofeng Wang
Associate Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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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; and orchid mycorrihizal relations
Areas of Research
Parasitic plants; plant communication; and weed evolution
Susan Whitehead
Associate Professor of Biological Sciences
Department of Biological Sciences
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Areas of Research
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
Brenda S.J. Winkel
Professor of Biological Sciences
Department of Biological Sciences
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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
Clay Wright
Assistant Professor
Biological Systems Engineering
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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
Yun Yin
Assistant Professor
Department of Food Science and Technology
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Areas of Research
Identification of aroma and flavor compounds in food systems; characterization of aroma/flavor formation pathways; convenient synthesis of highly unstable odorants; and applying novel engineering solutions to existing difficulties in flavor manufacturing
Yuan Zeng
Assistant Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Plant Pathology; host-microbe interactions; and data science
Bo Zhang
Associate Professor
School of Plant and Environmental Sciences
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Areas of Research
Soybean breeding; and crop genetics
Areas of Research
Molecular plant-microbe interactions; plant biotechnology; and controlled-environment agriculture