Graduate Programs Faculty: Department of Horticulture

Graduate Faculty

The faculty are stationed in Saunders or Latham Halls on the Blacksburg campus, at four experiment stations throughout the state, and at the Institute for Advanced Learning & Research (IALR) in Danville. Although not all faculty serve directly as advisors to graduate students, all are available as resources to graduate programs.
In addition to the graduate programs in horticulture offered on the Blacksburg campus, a non-thesis graduate program is available at the Hampton Roads Agricultural Research & Extension Center (HRAREC) in the Norfolk-Virginia Beach area. Known as the off-campus Master's in Horticulture, the program offers a single graduate course each semester for students in one of Virginia's most populous areas. It is intended primarily for those already employed in the horticultural industry to earn a Master's degree on a part-time basis. Courses are taught by faculty at HRAREC with occasional visits from on-campus faculty in particular specializations. Students will be eligible for the M.S. after satisfactorily completing 30 credit hours.

ON-CAMPUS FACULTY

Eric P. Beers, Associate Professor, Ph.D., University of Wisconsin, 1990.
Research interests include the biochemistry and molecular biology of proteases involved in programmed cell death and the functional genomics of vascular tissue-specific genes. (ebeers@vt.edu)

Rumen Conev, Assistant Professor and Director, Virginia Plant Introduction Program 'Beautiful Gardens', Ph.D., Plovdiv, Bulgaria, 1992.
Dr. Conev's research interest is in plant breeding with emphasis on ornamental plants. His research involves classical and in-vitro approaches for plant improvement, including ploidy breeding and mutagenesis. (conevr@vt.edu)

J. Roger Harris, Associate Professor, Ph.D., Cornell University, 1993.
Dr. Harris' research focuses on landscape plant establishment, nursery production, and the ecology of root growth, including post-transplant irrigation practices, physiological response to transplanting, and seasonal aspects of root regrowth of container-grown and field-grown trees. (rharris@vt.edu)

Joyce G. Latimer, Professor, Ph.D., Purdue University, 1986.
Dr. Latimer conducts research on plant growth and development with emphasis on growth regulation, conditioning, and production of greenhouse crops. (jlatime@vt.edu)

Alan R. McDaniel, Associate Professor, Ph.D., University of Tennessee, 1975.
Dr. McDaniel provides statewide extension assistance to high school and community college horticulture teachers. (alanmcd@vt.edu)

Robert F. McDuffie, Associate Professor, M.L.A., North Carolina State University, 1978.
Mr. McDuffie teaches and works in the area of landscape design, establishment, and maintenance. (mcduff@vt.edu)

Alex X. Niemiera, Associate Professor, Ph.D., Virginia Polytechnic Institute & State University, 1985.
Dr. Niemiera's research concerns the development of strategies to increase irrigation and fertilization efficiency for container-grown plant production. He is also investigating strategies to communicate invasive plant information to the ornamental horticulture industry and the public. (niemiera@vt.edu)

Jerzy Nowak, Professor and Department Head, Ph.D., Olsztyn, Poland, 1973.
Dr. Nowak's research involves ecophysiology/molecular biology of plant-microbial interaction, with emphasis on the management of bacterial endophytes that enhance plant stress tolerance and growth. (jenowak@vt.edu)

Holly L. Scoggins, Associate Professor and Director, Hahn Horticulture Garden, Ph.D., North Carolina State University, 1999.
Dr. Scoggins' research involves greenhouse and nursery production systems for herbaceous perennials, including flowering physiology of and production methods for new floriculture crops. (hollysco@vt.edu)

Vladimir Shulaev, Research Associate Professor, Virginia Bioinformatics Institute, Ph.D., Rutgers University, 1995.
Dr. Shulaev's research focuses on the biochemical, cellular and molecular mechanisms of plant responses to biotic and abiotic stress. (vshulaev@vbi.vt.edu)

Joel L. Shuman, Adjunct Professor, Virginia Bioinformatics Institute, Ph.D., North Carolina State University, 2001.
Dr. Shuman works in plant breeding/genetics, collection and evaluation of small fruit and metabolomic analysis of stress response of plants, yeast, and plasmodium (malaria agent). (jshuman@vbi.vt.edu)

Jim Tokuhisa, Assistant Professor, Ph.D., University of Wisconsin, 1986.
Dr. Tokuhisa's research focuses on the biochemistry and biology of compounds that plants produce for their survival against pathogens and herbivores. (tokuhisa@vt.edu)

Richard E. Veilleux, Professor, Ph.D., University of Minnesota, 1981.
Dr. Veilleux' research is focused on the development and use of inbred lines of potato, insertional mutagenesis of strawberry, and transformation methodology. (potato@vt.edu)

Gregory E. Welbaum, Professor, Ph.D., University of California, Davis, 1988.
Dr. Welbaum conducts research on seed physiology and the growth and development of vegetable crops, with emphasis on factors contributing to seed vigor and crop establishment under field conditions. (welbaum@vt.edu)

Jerry M. Williams, Associate Professor, Ph.D., University of Maryland, 1978.
Dr. Williams' research concentration is in mechanical and environmental stress on growth, fruiting, and photosynthetic efficiency of strawberry. (williamj@vt.edu)

Robert D. Wright, Julian and Margaret Gary Professor, Ph.D. Purdue University, 1971.
Research focuses on developing efficient production systems for container-grown nursery crops. (wrightr@vt.edu)

OFF CAMPUS FACULTY

The Hampton Roads Agricultural Research & Extension Center is located approximately 300 miles east of Blacksburg in Virginia Beach. The Center houses three horticulture faculty primarily concerned with extension and research programs covering nursery production, landscape installation and management, and urban tree care. A total of six Virginia Tech faculty at HRAREC participates in the M.S. in Horticulture degree program, the only extended campus graduate degree offered through the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

Bonnie Lee Appleton, Professor, Ph.D., Oklahoma State University, 1983.
Dr. Appleton's research includes nursery production, seeking alternative plants for utility easements, and landscape installation procedures. She is also the coordinator of the HRAREC MS program. (bapple@vt.edu)

Thomas J. Banko, Associate Professor, Ph.D., University of Idaho, 1974.
Dr. Banko's current research focuses on chemical growth regulation and disease control of nursery and landscape plants. (tbanko@vt.edu)

Laurie J. Fox, Horticulture Associate, M.S., North Carolina State University, 1993. Ms. Fox's research focuses on aquatic plant production systems, aquatic vegetation management, and the use of recycled water in landscapes. She is curator of the native plant Bayscape display garden at HRAREC. (ljfox@vt.edu)

Adjunct Faculty

Yinghui Dan, Ph.D., Research Assistant Professor, IALR. Dr. Dan' current research programs have focused on the following areas:novel plant and microbe transformation systems, disease resistance and ornamental traits for horticulture crops and clonal forest via genetic engineering, and molecular mechanisms of plant transformation. (ydan@vt.edu)

Dr. Javed Iqbal. Dr. Iqbal's primary research interests are developing DNA markers for plant improvement, gene mapping, marker assisted plant breeding, application of genomic tools to elucidate plant response to biotic stress with particular emphasis on soybean root response to Fusarium virguliforme, the causative agent of sudden death syndrome of soybean. Secondary research interests include nutraceuticals effects on obesity, diabetes and metabolic syndrome in rat models.

Dr. Barry Flinn, Director - ISRR. Dr. Flinn's research interests have focused on the use of genomics to identify genes associated with quality traits and characteristics for forestry species (Pinus and Eucalyptus - wood quality and development, reproductive control, stress tolerance) and agricultural species (Potato – tuber health and processing quality). This research has primarily used high throughput EST generation from cDNA libraries, in silico expression profiling, as well as some microarray expression profiling for the data mining. (bflinn@vt.edu)

Patty Kitchin (pkitchin@vt.edu)

Zhiwu Li Ph.D. (zhiwu.li@ialr.org)

Dr. Joel Shuman, Postdoctoral Associate Virginia Bioinformatics Institute (VBI) Dr. Shuman's research interests include small fruit genetics and breeding, plant pathology, crop modeling and simulation, acquired systemic resistance of commercial strawberry, functional genomics in the diploid strawberry (Fragaria vesca) and metabolomics (gas chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry) of organisms such as Arabidopsis, yeast, and Plasmodium. (jshuman@vt.edu)

David Tay (tay.9@osu.edu)

Chunxia Wang (cwang1@vt.edu)

THE EASTERN SHORE AGRICULUTRAL RESEARCH & EXTENSION CENTER is located 380 miles east of Blacksburg in Painter, Virginia, in the heart of Virginia's major vegetable production area. One Horticulture faculty member (search in progress) conducts research on vegetable production at this station.

THE SOUTHERN PIEDMONT AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH & EXTENSION CENTER in Blackstone, Virginia, situated centrally in the state, is dedicated to research and extension programs for sustainable production of tobacco, small fruits, forage crops, and grains. One faculty member in Horticulture conducts small fruit research.

Jeremy Pattison, Assistant Professor, Ph.D., Cornell, 2004. Dr. Pattison conducts research on genetic improvement and production of small fruit, including blackberries, blueberries, red raspberries, and strawberries. (jpfruit@vt.edu)

THE ALSON H. SMITH, JR. AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH & EXTENSION CENTER is located 210 miles north of Blacksburg in the Shenandoah Valley. The station houses two horticulture faculty members.

Tony K. Wolf, Professor, Ph.D., Cornell, 1986.
Dr. Wolf conducts viticulture research and extension programs, including evaluation of wine grape training systems, crop level effects on wine grape quality, varietal evaluations, plant growth regulator effects, and exploration of alternative hosts and vectors of the disease agent that causes grapevine yellows. (vitis@vt.edu)

Rongcai Yuan, Assistant Professor, Ph.D, University of Massachusetts, 1998.
Dr. Yuan conducts research on chemical control of apple fruit thinning and molecular models of abscission.(yuan@vt.edu)