Graduate Program | Faculty | Facilities | Courses | Financial Assistance | Graduate Guidelines | Recent Graduates | Hampton Roads Program
Molecular
Cell Biology and Biotechnology |
Interdepartmental Plant Physiology
Genetics,
Bioinformatics, and Computational Biology
Graduate School | Surrounding Area | The University
Facilties
On Campus
Departmental offices,
laboratories, and classroom facilities are located in Saunders Hall. Twenty
faculty offices occupy approximately 3417 sq. ft. An additional 1200 sq.
ft. are assigned in four locations throughout Saunders Hall to clerical,
stenographic, and bookkeeping services. Approximately 980 sq. ft. are
assigned to graduate students and technicians for office space. Four classrooms
are assigned for exclusive departmental use, i.e., Floral Design, Landscape
Design, and a 25-station computer laboratory. Five research laboratories
(3639 sq. ft.) are located in Saunders Hall, along with controlled environment
rooms (754 sq. ft.). In addition, the department has exclusive use of
its own conference room (390 sq. ft.) and the Horticulture Club has a
student lounge area (350 sq. ft.). A new state-of-the-art plant science
laboratory building is being planned for completion in 2004.
Greenhouse space
assigned to the department exceeds 20,000 sq. ft. of which approximately
one half is glass and the other half fiberglass. Located within the headhouse
are a classroom, storage space, and two rooms used as a residence for
students who provide weekend labor and security. Four acres adjacent to
the greenhouse are set aside for the VT Horticulture Gardens.
The Virginia Tech Horticulture Gardens is an extensively managed one-acre
site that supports some of the teaching and outreach efforts in out Landscape
Contracting option. An enlargement of the gardens by three more acres
on adjacent land is being planned. More detailed information about the
VT Horticulture Gardens is available here.
A 1,700 acre college farm contains orchards and vegetable and small fruit
plots to support the educational and research efforts of the department.
Two general purpose buildings are available along with cold storage at
the orchard site where plantings of apples, peaches, nectarines, grapes,
strawberries and blueberries now exist.
A four-acre site adjacent to campus is used as an Urban Horticulture Center
where research on nursery crops and urban landscape practice is conducted.
Off Campus
Faculty are also located at four agriculture research and extension centers
(AREC) across the state. The Alson H. Smith Jr. AREC is located at Winchester
and focuses its programs on tree fruits and grapes. There are four faculty
located there. Another center is located in the piedmont area of the state
where work in horticulture focuses on brambles and blueberries. Virginia
Beach is the site of the Hampton Roads AREC where programs focus on the
nursery and landscape plant industry. Hampton Roads is also the site of
our off-campus M.S. program where 15 to 20 graduate students are enrolled.
The other AREC where Horticulture faculty are located is in Painter, Virginia,
on the Eastern shore of Virginia. Their main focus is on vegetable research.
