Faculty
Surinder Chopra
Professor of Maize Genetics
Regulation of flavonoid biosynthesis during plant development and plant-pathogen interaction. Epigenetic regulation and allele specific patterns.
Erin Connolly
Professor and Head of Plant Science
Molecular mechanisms of micronutrient transport. Iron uptake and compartmentalization. Metal ion homeostasis
Daniel Cosgrove
Eberly Chair and Professor of Biology
Mechanism of plant growth. Function and evolution of expansins. Biochemistry and rheology of plant cell walls. Growth responses to light, hormones, and water stress and other stimuli.
Claude dePamphilis
Director of the Center for Parasitic and Carnivorous Plants; Huck Distinguished Chair in Plant Biology and Evolutionary Genomics; Professor of Biology
Genomics, bioinformatics, and molecular evolution. Origin and diversification of flowers and developmental pathways. Comparative genomics of plants, organelles, and plant gene families. Genomics, evolution, and functional biology of parasitic plants.
Francesco Di Gioia
Associate Professor of Vegetable Crop Science
Plant nutrition, plant physiological and biochemical response to environmental and abiotic stress conditions, sustainable vegetable production, agrobiodiversity, agronomic biofortification, food and nutrition security.
Sjoerd Willem Duiker
Professor of Soil Management and Applied Soil Physics
David Eissenstat
Professor of Woody Plant Physiology
Plant physiological ecology. Root biology and physiology. Plant carbon and nutrient economies.
Gary Felton
Professor and Department Head of Entomology
Plant-herbivore interactions. Adaptive responses of herbivores to plant defenses. Herbivore cues recognized by plants with specific focus on biochemical and molecular analysis of salivary secretions.
Majid Foolad
Professor of Plant Genetics
Genetic characterization of resistance/tolerance to biotic/abiotic stresses, and genes/QTLs contributing to tomato fruit quality. Investigation of genes/QTLs for directed crop improvement and germplasm enhancement. Tomato cultivar development & release.
David Geiser
Professor of Mycology
Molecular evolutionary genetics of pathogenic and toxigenic fungi.
Ying Gu
Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
Mechanism of cellulose biosynthesis in higher plants. Genetic modification of plant cell wall to scale-up biofuel production.
Mark Guiltinan
Director, Plant Institute; J. Franklin Styer Professor of Horticultural Botany; Professor of Plant Molecular Biology
Plant functional genomics, metabolomics and biotechnology. Identification of key genes for disease resistance and important traits in the tree crop Theoboma cacao, the Chocolate tree.
