The 38 faculty members of the Plant Biology Graduate Program represent eight departments at the University as well as Five College faculty from Amherst, Mount Holyoke and Smith. The departments at UMass are Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Biology, Chemical Engineering, Food Science, Microbiology, Natural Resources Conservation and Plant, Soil and Insect Sciences. To find out more about individual faculty, click on their name listed below to link to their faculty home page.

Faculty and graduate students have access to major research facilities including: microbial and plant growth facilities, tissue culture facilities, radioisotope laboratories, facilities for bioinformatics, facilities for monoclonal antibody and recombinant DNA work, a DNA sequencing service, a high-field NMR facility, an imaging facility with confocal and electron microscopy and a mass spectrometry facility. There are several greenhouse complexes on campus with a combined total of more than 17,000 sq. ft. of bench, ground and bed space. The Morrill Science Center greenhouses service members of the Biology Department and about half of the greenhouse space is devoted to research projects. The other half is used to maintain a general teaching collection representing more than 680 genera and 1,100 species for courses ranging from angiosperm systematics to plant cell biology. The University of Massachusetts Herbarium is a regional resources with approximately 224,000 mounted vascular plants, algae and bryophytes as well as a fruit and seed collection providing material for systematic studies and plant identification. The Biological Sciences Library provides critical resources for research in the life sciences.

Many PB faculty have one-semester graduate student rotation projects available as part of their overall research projects. PhD students that have not been targeted to a faculty member's lab prior to admission must participate in two rotations before choosing their final research area as part of their formal academic requirements.

Rotation projects in the following labs are available:

Name

Phone (413)

Email address

PSIS
Fernald 209e

lsadler@ent.umass.edu

Adler Lab homepage

Alpert, Peter

Biology
Morrill 3 - 409

Ecology of plant invasion, resource capture and utilization by clonal plants

palpert@bio.umass.edu

Barker, Allen

Plant nutrition, stress ethylene, compost utilization

barker@pssci.umass.edu

Baskin@bio.umass.edu

Baskin Lab homepage

Bernatzky, Robert

PSIS
French 204A

Molecular markers for plant genome analyses

rb@pssci.umass.edu

Biology
Mor. 3 - 122A

Boyle, Thomas

In memoriam, passed away 12/19/2006

Biology- Mor 2 - 420

Plant molecular evolution and evolutionary genomics

caicedo@bio.umass.edu

Caicedo Lab homepage

Cannon, Maura

Biochem
LGRT-822

Plant growth and development as influenced by cell wall assembly

mcannon@biochem.umass.edu

Caruso, Frank

PSIS
Cranberry Exp. Station

fcaruso@umext.umass.edu

Cheung, Alice

Biochem
LGRT-B 1226

Biochemistry and molecular analysis of sexual reproduction

acheung@biochem.umass.edu

Clark, John Marshall

Vet/Animal Sci.
Morrill N

Pesticide and environmental toxicology

jclark@vasci.umass.edu

Cooley, Daniel

PSIS
Clark 103

Ecology of plant diseases, integrated pest management, sustainable agriculture

dcooley@microbio.umass.edu

Cooley Lab homepage

Craker, Lyle

PSIS
Stockbridge 12A

Physiology and biochemistry of oils and essences in herbs

craker@pssci.umass.edu

DaCosta, Michelle

Plant responses to environmental stresses, with emphasis
on drought and temperature stresses of grasses.

mdacosta@psis.umass.edu

Frary, Amy

Mount Holyoke, 120C Carr Lab

Basic and applied aspects of plant genome analysis

afrary@mtholyoke.edu

Han, Susan

Physiology of flowering and postharvest care of floricultural crops

susanh@umext.umass.edu

Forest Ecology: canopy processes and regeneration of native and invasive species

Hepler, Peter

Biology
Morrill 3 - 120

Cell division and pollen tube growth; the role of calcium and the cytoskeleton

hepler@bio.umass.edu

Hepler Lab homepage

Jung, Geunhwa

PSIS
French 206

Molecular genetics and breeding of disease resistance in grasses and population genetics of plant pathogenic fungi

jung@psis.umass.edu

Kelty, Matt

Nat. Res. Conservation
Holdsworth 218

Forest ecology, management and silviculture

kelty@forwild.umass.edu

glanza@nre.umass.edu

Director of Environmental Sciences

Mangan, Frank

PSIS
Bowditch

Vegetable production with an emphasis on soil fertility and ethnic crops

fmangan@umext.umass.edu

Manning, William

PSIS
Fernald 207B

Assessing air pollution effects on plant growth and reproduction, bioindicators, plant growth in urban environments.

wmanning@microbio.umass.edu

Normanly, Jennifer

Biochem.
LGRT-B 1022

Auxin biosynthesis and high-throughput metabolic profiling  

normanly@biochem.umass.edu

Normanly Lab homepage

PSIS - 204B Fernald (on sabbatical Spring 2007)

Roberts, Susan

Chem.Eng
Goessman

Optimization of secondary metabolite accumulation in plant cell tissue cultures

sroberts@ecs.umass.edu

Schnell, Danny

Biochem.
LGRT-B 1020

Intracellular protein targeting and chloroplast biogenesis

dschnell@biochem.umass.edu

Searcy, Karen

Biology
Morrill 3 - 401B

Herbarium curator; taxonomy and plant ecology

ksearcy@bio.umass.edu

Herbarium

Shetty, Kalidas

Food Sci.
Chenowith - 340

Plant and environmental biotechnology, plant secondary metabolism, tissue culture  

kalidas@foodsci.umass.edu

Walker, James

Biology
Morrill 2 - 354

Phylogeny, Classification and Evolutionary Phytogeography of Flowering Plants

jwalker@bio.umass.edu

Walker, Elsbeth

Biology
Morrill 3 - 311. Director, PB Program

Molecular genetic approaches to studying mechanisms of metal ion homeostasis in plants

ewalker@bio.umass.edu

Walker Lab homepage

Wetzel, Carolyn

Smith College, 214 Sabin Reed

Plant chloroplast development and function; plant cell development; plant physiology

cwetzel@email.smith.edu

Wick, Robert

PSIS
Fernald – 111

Bacterial and fungal diseases of vegetable and greenhouse crops, nematode diseases of turf, plant disease diagnostics

rwick@pltpath.umass.edu

Woodcock, Chris

Biology
Morrill 4 - 434

Nuclear structure/function, chromatin architecture and dynamics

chris@bio.umass.edu