FACULTY
Zach Brym
Assistant Professor — Agroecology - TREC
Dr. Brym’s research and extension program explore how production systems can remain profitable while conserving natural resources and protecting the environment. His projects focus on the role of biodiversity and scale in agroecosystems, the distribution and management of invasive plant and pest species, and the impacts of management practices on crop production and environmental conservation. His work recommends data-supported adaptive management practices across commodities to address local and regional challenges to crop production.
Dail Laughinghouse
Assistant Professor-Applied Phycology-Fort Lauderdale Research and Education Center.
Dr. Laughinghouse work is focused on both basic and applied algal research from Tropical to Polar Regions including diversity and toxicity of cyanobacteria, environmental influences on macroalgae and microbial photoautotrophs, novel applied uses for algae, bioremediation, and the detection and effects of bioactive compounds.
Greg MacDonald
Professor-Weedy Plant Management and International Agronomy-(Main Campus) Gainesville, FL
Dr. MacDonald current research program involves research on invasive species management, especially perennial grasses, and the physiological and biochemical aspects of herbicides. Dr. MacDonald also works with Florida Cooperative Invasive Species Management Areas (CISMAs), which is an alliance of stakeholders addressing invasive species management in Florida. He has several years of experience in international agronomy in Guyana and Haiti, and most recently Ghana, where he develops programs to help rural farmers with peanut production and value-added production systems.
Jianping Wang
Associate Professor -Peanut Symbiosis (Main Campus) Gainesville, FL
Research in Dr. Wang’s program is dedicated to using translational genomics to improve crop production in Florida. This integrated approach combines genomics, bioinformatics, molecular genetics, and biology to understand the genetic basis of important agronomic and economic traits of major row crops (e.g., sugarcane and peanut) and biofuel crops (e.g., energy cane and napiergrass). The overall goals of Dr. Wang’s program are to develop genetic markers associated with a breeder’s desired set of plant traits and to identify each component that influences those traits with the ultimate goal of designing systematic improvement strategies for developing superior crop cultivars.
Chris Wilson
Assistant Professor - Forage Crops - (Main Campus) Gainesville, FL
The central goal of research in the Wilson Lab is to improve management of pasture and rangeland for a variety of ecosystem services, with a special emphasis on strategies that can simultaneously enhance rural livelihood while contributing to climate change mitigation and ecosystem resilience.
James Estrada
Lecturer - Plant Science, Ecology, Invasive Species - Gainesville FL
Dr. Estrada earned his Ph.D. in Agronomy from the University of Florida, and has extensive experience with invasive species, agroecology and overall ecology.
Jose Dubeux
Associate Professor – Forage crops-Marianna, FL
Dr. Dubeux's major research focus is to develop sustainable livestock production systems. These systems must be locally important and at the same time address critical global challenges including climate change, the need for sustaining or achieving greater soil quality, and reduction in the use of fossil-fuel intensive, off-farm inputs.
Luke Flory
Associate Professor - Plant Community and Ecosystem Ecology - Agronomy (Main Campus) Gainesville, FL
In general, Dr. Flory research group seeks to advance general ecological knowledge of ecological communities and to answer applied questions that are relevant to natural areas management, restoration, and conservation. Research in the Flory Lab is focused broadly on understanding the ecology of biological invasions, including the community and ecosystem consequences of invasions, interactions between invasions and fire, the evolution of introduced species, and accumulation of pathogens. New projects under development will investigate the invasion risk of biofuel crops and the interaction between invasions and climate change.
Mike Mulvaney
Assistant Professor, Cropping Systems Specialist - Agronomy - WFREC
The focus of Dr. Mulvaney’s research program is to develop improved integrated crop fertility management tools and technologies. Crops of interest include peanut, cotton, corn, soybean, wheat, and carinata. His work incorporates enhanced efficiency fertilizers, improved irrigation strategies that optimize nutrient uptake and yield, precision agriculture applications, crop physiological responses to fertility, and the predictive potential of nutrient status on yield and yield components (such as seed quality in peanut).
Lynn Sollenberger
Professor-Forage Crops - Agronomy (Main Campus) Gainesville, FL
Dr. Sollenberger’s research is focused on grassland agroecosystems and emphasizes developing new knowledge in the areas of ecosystem services, sustainable production, and interactions of plants, animals, and the environment. I further seek to apply these principles to develop new technology to support statewide and regional livestock industries.
Jehangir Bhadha
Assistant Professor, Soil, Water & Nutrient Management - EREC
Water Quality, Soil Sustainability, Sustainable Agriculture & Nutrient Management.
Specific research areas include phosphorus cycling in natural ecosystems; application of soil amendments and soil fertility, and advancing sustainable agriculture research.
Samira Daroub
Professor, Soil and Environmental Chemistry - Soils and Water - EREC
Researches phosphorus chemistry and transformation in organic soils under flooded conditions; use of computer simulation models to predict phosphorus availability to plants as well as in environmental applications.
Gabriel Maltais-Landry
Assistant Profesor, Sustainable Nutrient Management Systems - Soils and Water Science
Nutrient cycling in agroecosystems, the impacts of agroecological practices (crop rotations, intercropping, cover-cropping) and alternatives to synthetic fertilizers (manures, composts, N-fixation) on carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus cycling as well as greenhouse gas emissions. Gabriel focuses on the interaction between soils and crops to maximize crop productivity, optimize nutrient availability, and minimize environmental impacts.
Cheryl Mackowiak
Associate Professor- Nutrient Management and Water Quality- (Quincy – NFREC)
Studies elemental (N, P, C) cycling in soils under perennial pasture-hay cropping systems and soil fertility requirements for nutrient best management practice (BMP) advancement.
Peter Nkedi-Kizza
Professor Emeritus - Soil Physics and Hydrology- (Gainesville – Main Campus)
The research includes agrichemical behavior under a variety of crop management practices through the evaluation of fate and transport as a function of soil properties.
Sarah Strauss
Assistant Professor- Soil Microbiology - (Immokalee – SFREC)
Examining the relationship between plant and soil microbial community within citrus and vegetable crops; exploring methods to manage or alter the soil microbial community to improve crop health and productivity.
Wesley Wood
Professor- (Milton – WFREC)
Supports and promotes research being conducted by WFREC faculty and staff. He also serves as a research scientist for WFREC faculty projects where soil science expertise is required.
Eban Bean
Assistant Professor- Urban Water Resources Management-(Gainesville – Main Campus)
Design, evaluation, and management of urban landscapes for water resource sustainability, and his extension program focuses on urban stormwater management, and how the design and management of drainage networks can be more sustainable.
Kati Migliaccio
Professional Engineer - (Gainesville – Main Campus)
Kati Migliaccio describes her professional focus as "all about water conservation, whether quality or quantity and identifying realistic and sustainable solutions." Water is the main character in a sustainability drama currently playing out in Florida and worldwide. Engineering principles can be applied to better manage water to meet growing population needs under increasing water supply uncertainty. Migliaccio works in different types of systems, including agricultural, natural, and urban.
Cheryl Palm
Research Professor- Biogeochemistry- (Gainesville – Main Campus)
Land-use change, degradation and rehabilitation, and ecosystem processes in tropical agricultural landscapes. She is currently working on indicators and methods for assessing and monitoring the sustainability of agricultural intensification.
Melanie Correll
Plant and Environment Interactions- (Gainesville – Main Campus)
Agricultural Production Engineering, G2P Models: Integrating genetics into crop models, Controlled environment agriculture, and Plant Space Biology: Effects of space and light on plant growth and development.
Young Gu Her
Assistant Professor – Hydrology & Agricultural Engineering - (Homestead – TREC)
Developing a simulation tool capable of providing a holistic view of climate change and sea-level rise impacts on South Florida’s agriculture and water resources. His long-term research interests lie in enhancing our ability to manage agricultural crop production and natural resources in sustainable ways by (1) developing unified fine-resolution large-scale (U.F.L.) simulation tools that facilitate integrated hydrological modeling and spatially consistent decision making and (2) creating new scientific knowledge that helps us better understand hydrological processes under projected changes in climate and sea level.
Gerrit Hoogenboom
Preeminent Scholar- Crop Modeling and Simulation Gainesville – Main Campus)
Impact of climate change; Computer modeling and simulation of agricultural systems; Decision Support Systems and GIS; Information technology; Agrometeorology; and Climatology.
Ray Huffaker
Bioeconomic and Nonlinear Data Diagnostics, Natural Resource and Environmental Law--(Gainesville – Main Campus)
Applying data diagnostic techniques to detect low-dimensional nonlinear deterministic structure in economic and biophysical time-sequenced data that can be used to construct hydrologic and bioeconomic models whose simulated dynamics match real-world complexity.
Greg Kiker
Professor-Coupled Human/Natural Modeling and Decision/Risk Analysis- (Gainesville – Main Campus)
Ecosystem and Hydrological Modeling for South Florida and Southern African Ecosystems; Simulation of Beef Cattle Farming Systems for Ecological and Enterprise Sustainability; Food/Ecology/Marine System Integration into Decision Support and Scenario Analysis Systems for the Caribbean Region; Adaptive Management Tools for Making Decisions with Uncertain Information; and Decision Support and Analysis for Sediment/Dredging Management and Ecosystem Restoration.
Eric McLamore
Assistant Professor- Biosensors and Nanotechnology- (Gainesville – Main Campus)
Development and application of sensor/biosensor technology for solving hypothesis-driven research questions in the life sciences.
Sanjay Shukla
Professor- Hydrology, Water Quality and Systems Research--(Immokalee – SFREC)
Designing production system to improve environmental and economic sustainability; Field- and watershed-scale hydrologic/water quality modeling; Payment for water-related ecosystem services from agriculture; Irrigation and drainage management; and Agricultural Best Management Practices (BMPs) for water conservation and water quality.
Amanda Hodges
Associate Extension Scientist-Plant biosecurity-(Gainesville - Main Campus)
The Biosecurity Research & Extension (BRE) lab focuses on investigating invasive, arthropod species of potential concern to Florida's landscape, natural areas, and agriculture.
Norm Leppla
Professor-Integrated Pest Management-(Gainesville - Main Campus)
Improve natural enemies for pests of agriculture, communities, and natural environments, and Develop IPM systems based on sustainable practices.
Xavier Martini
Assistant Professor-Integrated Pest Management, Chemical Ecology- (Quincy - NFREC)
Martini’s research focuses on different insect pest vectors of plant pathogens. Martini research focuses on four main projects: Asian citrus psyllid, The Redbay ambrosia beetle (RAB), Vegetable entomology, and Rose rosette disease.
Oscar Liburd
Professor - Fruit and Vegetable Entomology-(Gainesville - Main Campus)
Small fruit and vegetable pest management with emphasis on blueberry pests.
Silvana V. de Paula-Moraes
Assistant Professor- Applied ecology/IPM - (Jay - WFREC)
Insect ecology, Integrated Pest Management and Insect resistance management.
Rachel Mallinger
Assistant Professor -Pollination Ecology- (Gainesville - Main Campus)
Dr. Mallinger’s lab conducts research in three general areas, 1. Enhancing our understanding of basic bee biology including bee behavior, life history, and ecology, 2. Investigating the effects of disturbance and conservation on pollinator abundance and diversity, and 3. Examining interactions between bees and the plants that they pollinate.