Annual Retreats

2024 Annual Retreat

MS section
- 1^st - Rachel Rackers: Understanding the role of miRNAs in AMF symbiosis to increase sorghum biofuel production
- 2^nd - Sydney Webb: Breeding for improved disease resistance in Arachis hypogaea: A focus on Tomato Spotted Wilt Virus
PhD section:
- 1^st - Qian Feng: Identification and Characterization of an E8 Paralog in Flavor Aroma Volatile Production in Tomato Fruits
- 2^nd - Anne Frances Jarrell: Mining the wild species Solanum microdontum for the improvement of cultivated potato
- 3^rd - Anita Giabardo: The High-Resolution Transcriptional Landscape of Xylan Biosynthesis: Insights from Single Cell RNA-seq
Staff/Postdoc section:
- 1^st - Dan Laspisa: Genetic Determinants of Aerial Root Formation in Maize: Prospects for Harnessing Biological Nitrogen Fixation
- 2^nd - Jianxin Zhao: single amino acid variant in a knotted-1 transcription factor modulates S/G lignin ratios in switchgrass

L-R: Wayne Parrott, Dan Laspisa, Jianxin Zhao, Anita Giabardo, Rachel Rackers, Sydney Webb, Anne Jarrell, Qian Feng, Harsha Thippareddi

3499 US-76 W
Hiawassee, GA 30546

MS section
- 1^st Place: Gema Nugraha
  Capturing diversity from uncharacterized wild peanut collection
- 2^nd Place: Chad Hawkins
  Efficient transformation and regeneration of morning glory
PhD section:
- 1^st Place: Vincent Pennetti
  Generation of auxotrophic agrobacterium strains using a CRISPR-mediated base-editor
- 2nd Place: Qian Feng
  Characterization of a novel fruit flavor aroma locus in tomato
- 3^rd Place: Nathaniel Burner
  Developing and deploying a UAS-based pipeline for determining maturity of so
Staff/Postdoc section:
- 1^st Place: Eudald Illa Berenguer
  Bladderwort short sequences work as insulators in Nicotiana plants

801 Front Avenue
Columbus, GA 31901

M.S.
- First Place – Sefa Ayten
  Title: Chromosome-scale Genome Assembly of the Medicinal Plant Teucrium marum (Lamiaceae)
- Second Place – Stephanie Botton
  Title: Identifying and Characterizing Recombinant Lines of the Arachis cardenasii A09 Introgression in a Recombinant Inbred Peanut Population
Ph.D.
- First Place – Vinavi Gamage
  Title: Perturbations to soybean methionine metabolism underlying SHMT8-mediated resistance to soybean cyst nematode
- Second Place – Qian Feng
  Title: Candidate gene identification for tomato aroma volatiles through an automatic gene screening pipeline with GWAS and linkage mapping
- Second Place – Manoj Sapkota
  Title: Genome-wide association mapping for fruit volatiles contributing to tomato flavor
Staff/Post-Doc
- First Place – Nicole Bachleda
  Title: Genetic Loci Rj5 and Rj6 Control Nodulation in Soybean
- Second Place – Raquel Rocha
  Title: Novel dorsal gland effector candidates identified from rootknot nematode adult females

1175 North Beachview Drive
Jekyll Island, Georgia 31527