Qian Feng
Exploiting Ancestral Germplasm for Improving Tomato Fruit Quality
Sindoor Nalajala
Building Better Blueberries for Georgia through Interspecific Hybridization
Namrata Maharjan
Genetic dissection and deployment of wild introgressions for disease resistance and pod quality in peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.)
Tosin Olorunwo
The effect of endogenous methyl salicylate on the post harvest cold storage of tomato
Shan Jian
When physics and chemistry meet plant biology: next-generation biolistics for genome editing
Achyut Duwadi
Fighting Scab in Pecans: Path for durable resistance
Sameer Pokhrel
What’s Threatening Your Peanut Butter Sandwich?
Jazib Ali Irfan
Genomic Prediction, Yield Stability, and Integration of Root and Photosynthetic Traits for Biomass Yield Improvement in Switchgrass (Panicum virgatum L.)
Dr. Maria Salas-Fernandez
Harnessing Genomic and Phenomic Strategies to Improve Sorghum Yield Potential: Challenges and Opportunities
Dr. David Douches (The 5th annual Roger and Cindy Excellence in Plant Breeding Lecture Series)
Diploid Potato Breeding: Progress and Challenges
Dr. Kate Evans
Pome Fruit Breeding at Washington State University
2025
Millicent Avosa
Bridging the Wild-Cultivated Divide Using Chromosome Segmented Substitution Lines (CSSLs)
Prasanna Kharel
Fighting Aflatoxin in Peanut: Multiscale Mitigation Strategies, from Fields to Genes
Tosin Olorunwo
The Genetics and Physiology of Blossom End Rot in Tomato
Saptarshi Mondal
Genetic control of salt tolerance traits in Chloridoideae subfamily
Anne Marie Gahagan
Identifying QTLs Associated with Nut Shape Characteristics in Pecan: Evaluating Texture and Storability in Muscadine Germplasm
Swikriti Pandey
Expanding Genetic Diversity for Peanut Breeding
Ben Culver
Identification of Candidate Quantitative Trait Loci for Resistance to Ramularia Leaf Spot in Upland Cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.)
Dr. Michael Cacciatore, University of Georgia
Dr. Vance Whitaker, University of Florida
Dr. Sushan Ru, Auburn University
Shreena Pradhan
Determining the Genetics of Leaf Traits Associated with Salt Tolerance in Zoysiagrass
Skye Remko
What you need to know about nature's "gene jockey"
Jackline Litunya
A Watermelon Battle: Whiteflies and the Viruses They Transmit
Bukhtaawer Talat
CLRDV: A Threat to Cotton Production
Yongjun Yue
Breeding and Propagation of Lagerstroemia Cultivars
Harshita Saxena
Host specificity of Magnaporthe oryzae across Poaceae and resistance mechanisms in rice and tall fescue
Rachel Rackers
Investigation of the Role of MiRNAs and Symbiotic Fungi in Biofuel Sorghum Production
Nathaniel Burner
Improving Soybean through High-Thoroughput Phenotyping and Drought Tolerance
Mylee Mobley
Evaluation of Cowpea for Resistance to the Cowpea Curculio
Emily Powell
Coffee Under Siege: Preventing a Caffeine Crisis
Kamalpreet Dhillon
Beyond Natural Limits: Enhancing Variation in Turfgrass
Leah Tomey
The Genetics and Biochemistry Behind a Flavor that's Anything But Plain
Namrata Maharjan
Going Viral: Saving the Food We Love
Habib Widyawan
How To Protect Soybean From Southern Stem Canker
Anita Giabardo
Live Fast, Last Long: Apples' Race Against Time
Anne Frances Jarrell
Defeating Late Blight, Potato’s Arch Nemesis
Raegan Holton
Putting the "able" in Sustainable Agriculture: Using Peanuts and Genetics
Iago Schardong
Fiber Wars: A new hope for cotton over synthetics
Eddie Beasley
Evaluation of Cotton Germplasm for Resistance to Endemic Diseases in the Southeast United States
Brody Deaton
Improving Tolerance to Dinitroaniline Herbicides in Tall Fescue, Schedonorus arundinacea
Vinavi Gamage Lakshman
Investigation of the molecular basis of soybean cyst nematode resistance in soybean and its impact on soybean growth and development
Anita Giabardo
Another brick in the (cell) wall. How improved biomass can open doors to tomorrow's bioplastic
Kelly Goode
Elucidating the Molecular Basis of Soybean Resistance to the Southern Root-Knot Nematode
Dr. Phil Simon
Carrot Breeding to Reduce Inputs for Growers and Increase Outputs for Consumers
Jazib Irfan
The King of Fruits: What makes a MANGO
Yongjun Yue
Advances and Innovations in Rose Breeding: From Genetics to Garden
Qian Feng
Flavorful Aromas: The Scents Behind Your Favorite Fruits
Habib Widyawan
Can cooking be more sustainable?
Caitlin McCann
The State of Peaches in the Peach State
Harshita Saxena
The Quest for a Perfect Lawn: How America’s best grass came to be
Anne Collart
Goodbye Pesto? Overcoming the Basil Downy Mildew Pandemic
Akshaya Biswal
IPBGG Membership Seminar: Fast Forward Peanut Breeding for Disease Resistance and Seed Quality
John Bagwell
Deciphering the Genetics of Hessian Fly, Leaf Rust, and Stripe Rust Resistance in Wheat in the Southeastern US (Dissertation Defense)
Rachel Rackers
MiRNA Ninjas: Overlooked Players to Increase Sorghum Biofuel Production
Kelly Goode
From Roots to Resilience: Plant Breeding for Nematode Resistance
Nathaniel Burner
Come Fly With Me: Drone-based Estimation of Soybean Maturity
Shreena Pradhan
Paint Your Plate Purple
Amol Nankar
Vegetable Breeding – Breeding Pipeline Development to Variety Release
Jon Cody
Developing tools for improving the process of plant transformation and gene editing
Andrew Ogden
Breeding Horticultural Crops for Controlled Environment Agriculture: A New Horizon
2023
Mylee Mobley
Host Plant Resistance: Cowpea vs. Curculio
Katie Toomey
Rooting Against the Odds: A Success Story from African Fields
Samantha Wan Fiber Quality Improvement of Upland cotton (Gossypium Hirsutum L.) through Interspecific Introgression
Razi Ibrahim
Developing 2,4-D resistant white clover through mutation breeding and recurrent selection
Gema Nugraha
Rediscovering a Legacy: Finding Adaptability in Lost Peanut
Dr. Andrew Wiersma
Plant Breeder, Edible Bean Breeding and Genetics at Archer Daniels Midland
Guarab Bhattarai
Genetic Analysis of Nut Shape and Scab Resistance in Pecan
Daniel Matusinec
Bringing together peanut wild relatives to combat stem rot
Angel Brooks
My Relationship with Renewable Energy and Switchgrass
Hallie Wright
Full Blast: Overcoming Finger Millet’s Biggest Villain
Nathaniel Burner
Can Breeding End the War on Tobacco?
Brandon Tonnis
Peanut Oil Treasure Hunt: Breeding for an Overlooked Peanut Trait
Saptarshi Mondal
Can Zoysiagrass Beat Salts?
Namrata Maharjan
Spotting resistance in wild peanut relatives
Samikshya Rijal
Curiouser and Curiouser About Citrus
Holly W. Presley
Fortifying the Cereal Aisle
Razi Ibrahim
Grow Your Own Nitrogen: Improving Seed Yield of White Clover
Sydney Webb
A Champion in the Making? Improving Peanut's Resistance to Tomato Spotted Wilt Virus
Antonio Jose Monforte
Genetic basis of fruit morphology and domestication in melon
Brandon Tonnis
Open Sesame: Creating a Better Password for an Ancient Oilseed
Samantha Surber
Return of the Forest's Gentle Giant
Jordan Knapp-Wilson
James (Oglethorpe) and the Giant Peach: A Tale of How Georgia Became the Peach State
Kendall Lee
Characterization of the Tall Fescue Endophyte
Manoj Sapkota
Elucidating the genetic basis of flavor volatiles in tomato
Mark Miller
Predictive breeding to accelerate genetic gain in soybean
Sam McDonald
Genetic mapping of frogeye leaf spot resistance and breeding for improved seed composition in soybean
Harshita Saxena
Who’s eating all the chickpeas?
Samantha Wan
A Dip into Upland Cotton's Secondary Gene Pool for Fiber Quality Improvement
Brody Deaton
From Row Cropping to Turfgrass, Potential Uses and Impacts of Dinitroaniline Herbicide Resistance
Ben Culver
Watch out for Ramularia: an emerging cotton leaf disease
Daniel Matusinec
Bringing Cranberries to the Thanksgiving Table
Yongjun Yue
Legends, Hunters, and Thieves: The Stories Behind Our Backyard Landscaping
2022
Vinavi Lakshman
CRISPRing: Gene Editing to Accelerate Plant Breeding
Amanda Webb
A Seedy Story - Sterility in Bermudagrass Golf Greens
Austin Hart
Plant Aromatics: For More Than Just the Birds and Bees
Holly Wright Presley
A Royal Homecoming - Improving Low pH and Aluminum Tolerance in Alfalfa for the Southeast
Zachary Fleming
Blossom End Rot: A Multi-Species Menace
Samikshya Rijal
Watermelon's Wild Friends - Introgressing Important Traits in a Favorite Fruit
Brianna Cheekc
An Analysis of the Tools for Mitigation of Aflatoxin Production in Peanut
John Bagwell
The Genetic Plan to Save our Bread
Kendall Lee
We Have History: The Coevolution of Asexual Epichloe Endophytes and Cool-Season Grasses
Natacha Namphengsone
The Role of OFPs and TRMs in Organogenesis
Sefa Ayten
Genome Analysis of the Medicinal Plant Teucrium marum (Lamiaceae)
Alexandra Ostezan
Genetic Improvement of Soybean for Resistance to Soybean Cyst Nematode
Sam McDonald
Who Let the Frogs Out? Breeding Soybean to Prevent the Next Frogeye Leaf Spot Outbreak
Ethan Menke
Advancing Soybean Breeding Through Disease Resistance, Climate Resilience, and High-Throughput Phenotyping
Gaurab Bhattarai
PBGG Spring Student Seminar: An Uncovered Gem of the South: the Muscadines
Edward Beasley
Navigating Native Traits of Cotton Responsible for Nematode Resistance
Madhav Subedi
Quinoa: South America's Gift to Your Kitchen
Alexandra Ostezan
Combatting Soybean Cyst Nematode: Helping Soybeans in the Fight Against Yield Loss
Manoj Sapkota
Language of Plants: Understanding the Plant Vocabulary and its Possible Implications in Crop Breeding
Samuele Lamon
Italian Chicory: Experiment with Bitterness and Colors in your Salads
2021
Dung Tran
Genetic mapping of QTL for and exploring the interaction of root microbiome with soybean cyst nematode resistance
Isabel Vales
Development of Climate-change-ready Potato Varieties to Overcome Heat Stress
Matthew Clark
Modern Grape Breeding, using DNA Markers to Enrich the Selection Process
Caleb Warrington
Sesame: Modernizing an Ancient Oilseed
Nino Brown
Powerful Peanuts - Leveraging Technology for Peanut Cultivar Development Research
Lovepreet Singh Chahal
Evaluation of Phylogenetically Distant BABY BOOM Genes for their Potential to Induce Parthenogenesis
Chandler Levinson
Characterization of Allotetraploids Cross-Compatible to Cultivated Peanut (Arachis hypogaea L.)
Samuele Lamon
Meiosis as a Causal Mechanism for Genome Variation
Kendall Lee
The Fungus That Feeds America
Vinavi Lakshman
Drink Tea and Be Merry: How Tea Keeps Getting Better
John Bagwell
The Genetic Tug of War to Keep Corn Safe
Emile Barnes
Breeding Hot Peppers and Why We Love Them
Qian Feng
How to Make Tomatoes Taste Better
Ed Beasley
Get Caught with Your Plants Down? Explaining the Science Behind Disease Resistance in Plants
Evan McCoy
Lucha for Lunch: Chemical Warfare on Your Dinner Plate
2020
Dr. Jonathan Jones
Plant Immunity: The Zigzag Turns Full Circle
Katherine Catching
Thesis Defense Seminar: Engineering Disease Resistance to Dollar Spot in Seashore Paspalum
Thomas Gottilla
Thesis Defense Seminar: Investigation into the Genetic Mechanisms of Salt Tolerance in Seashore Paspalum
Gary Orr
Thesis Defense Seminar: Genetic Engineering of Tall Fescue for Improved Turf Traits
Dr. Evans Lagudah
Durable Disease Resistance: Learning from Wheat
Jan Low
Zoom webinar: Developing Effective Breeding Programs and Delivery Systems for Biofortified Sweetpotato in Sub-Saharan Africa
Winnie Gimode
Fine-mapping of a Major Quantitative Trait Locus (QTL) Controlling Flowering Time and QTL Mapping for Gummy Stem Blight Resistance in Watermelon
Matthew Johnson
Developing and Implementing Genomic Resources for the Improvement of Millets and Hemp
Nathan Taitano
Exploring Genetic Diversity Underlying Fruit Diversity in Tomato and Pepper
Lucy Bell
Monkeying Around: The Genetics of Pollinator Attraction to Mimulus
Jubilee Park
Plant Synthetic Biology: An Era of New Discovery
Rasyidah Razar
QTL Analysis of Winter Dormancy and Biomass Quality Traits in Switchgrass by Rasyidah Razar
Brooks Arnold
Mining QTL for Elevated Protein and Sucrose Contents from Diverse Soybean Germplasm by Brooks Arnold
Gary Orr
Breakfast Bonanza: How Biotechnology Betters Banana
Lincoln Adams
The 100 Years' War: How Humans Spent a Century Fighting Gummy Stem Blight (and Made No Progress in Watermelon)
Katie Catching
Toughen Up Turf: Improving Dollar Spot Resistance in Turfgrass
Dung Tran
Wanted: The Yield Bandit - Protecting Soybean from Cyst Nematode
Ethan Menke
The Need for Speed: Accelerating Soybean Breeding Using High-Throughput Phenotyping
Yasin Topcu
Rotten or Ripe? How Science Rescured America's Favorite Tomato
2019
Jianli Chen
Prospects and Challenges to Improve Wheat Grain Yield Components Using Molecular Markers
Carolina Ballén-Taborda
Exploration of Arachis stenosperma as a Source of Nematode Resistance for Peanut
Davis Gimode
Genotypic and Phenotypic Dissection of Key Traits in Peanut with Emphasis on the Chromosome Segment Substitution Line (CSSL) Population
Matthew Chappell
Starting from Scratch: Ornamental Breeding & Selection in Response to Industry Needs
Eric Danquah
Impacting Food & Nutrition Security in sub-Saharan Africa: Training NextGen Plant Breeders for a Hungry, Growing and Changing sub-Saharan Africa
Paul Bosland
Chile Peppers: Breeding a Multifaceted Crop
Reagan Wiggins
Infection Detection: How Aflatoxin Accumulations Affects Gene Regulation in Peanut
Sam McDonald
From Field to Fryer: How Genetics Ignited High-heat Cooking Oil
Timothy Chappell
From Athens, Greece to Athens, Georgia: The Past, Present, and Future of Olives in the Southeast
Hallie Wright
Tiny Seeds, Enormous Impact: Finger Millet and Its Importance in the 21st Century
Brooks Arnold
It's Meal that Makes the Meat and the Soybean Genetics Behind It
Monica Prias Blanco
Flowers Designed to Attract
Dennis Byron
Plant Breeding Perspectives from the Private Sector
Matthew Johnson
Salt of the Earth: Chef's Delight a Breeder's Spite
Mark Miller
Saving America's Forests: The Science Behind Restoring American Chestnut Woodlands
2018
Monica Herrero-Huerta
Soybean High Throughput Phenotyping from UAS-based Visible and Multispectral Imagery
Liz Prenger
Genetic improvement of Soybean Seed Composition by Liz Prenger
Connor Ryan
Genetic Diversity and Boxwood Blight Susceptibility of Sarcococca (Sweet Box)
Laxman Adhikari
Dissecting the Genetic Basis of Various Adaptation Traits in Alfalfa Using QTL Mapping by Laxman Adhikari
Alexandra Oztecan
The Secret Ingredient to a More Perfect Meal: Soybean Seed Composition
Sakshi Pathania
Speed Breeding: Fruits on the Fastrack
Manoj Sapkota
How Tomatoes Got Bland and the Tastier Ones on the Way
Rion Mooneyham
Improving the Fountain of Youth: Breeding Centella asiatica
Ethan Menke
Not an Asteroid But Just as Fast: Soybean Sudden Death Syndrome and Breeding for Resistance
Carmen Kraus
Getting in Shape: Fruits and the Genes that Shape Them
Thomas Gotilla
The Red Scare: Searching for Resistance to the Ug99 Lineage of Wheat Stem Rust
Benjamin Lopez
Why Use Fungicides? Use Genetics: the Story of Wheat and Stripe Rust
Nathan Tatiano
Pick & Pack a Pepper: People, Their Plants, and the Importance of Shape
Rasyidah Mohamad Razar
Manipulation of Winter Dormancy Duration: Strategy for High Biomass Yield in Switchgrass
Alexis Ramos
Mining QTL for Fruit Weight Quality Traits in Uncharacterized Tomato Germplasm
Lucky Paudel
Refining of the egusi locus and mapping of seed coat color genes in watermelon
Ben Stewart-Brown
Genetic and Genomic Analyses for Improvement of Soybean Yield
Tofazzal Islam, Fulbright Visiting Scholar, West Virginia University
Novel genomic approaches for detection and mitigation of worrisome wheat blast in South Asia
Ana Claudia Araujo
Novel genomic approaches for detection and mitigation of worrisome wheat blast in South Asia
Clint Steketee, University of Georgia
Discovery of Germplasm and Genomic Regions to Improve Soybean Drought Tolerance
Joann Conner, University of Georgia
Apomixis in crops: An update on progress
Carolina Chavarro, University of Georgia
Whole genome re-sequencing of cultivated peanut to enable genetic and genomic resources for seed quality improvement
Shyam Tallury, USDA-ARS
National Peanut Collection: Maintenance and Characterization
Shreya Shanbhag
CSI - Cotton Screening Inquisition: The Case of the Target Spot
Chandler Levinson
The Wild Side of Peanut
Laxman Adhikari
Overcoming cold stress: genetic improvement of alfalfa for cold tolerance
Carolina Ballén Taborda
When close species get together: Homeologous chromosome exchange in the allopolyploid, peanut
Davis Gimode
Breed Craft: A conversation on the origin of food
Suraj Sapkota
Is bread wheat making you sick? The undesirable story of the most desired food, & how genetics will save it
Yasin Topcu
Mystery in the tomato patch: Solving blossom-end rot
