Research Programs

Strategic Thrust Areas

Impacts that relate to Public University as well as Land Grant College and Experiment Station missions are essential to the continued growth of the Department, College, and Experiment Station. Continued impacts will ensure relevance of the College and Experiment Station for our students and stakeholders long into the future.

In the next 5 years growth will continue in the departmental strategic thrust areas, including 1) Health Crops Research, 2) Nursery Crops Research, 3) Turfgrass Research, and 4) Basic Plant Biology and Pathology Research.

Some general areas of recent research are outlined below.

Crop Management

The research programs highlighted here provide a sampling of both established and recently added research programs. The faculty and their many collaborators elsewhere are making important impacts in crop management areas:

1. Postharvest Peach Evaluations of Varieties.
2. Ethylene Inhibition affects Peach Maturity and Senescence.
3. Chemical Fruit Thinning of Peach.
4. Effect of Soil Conditions on the Degradation of Cloransulam-methyl.
5. Ammonium Sulfate on the efficacy, absorption and translocation of glufosinate.
6. Impacts of Herbicide Resistant Maize on Weed Management.
7. Kentucky Bluegrass Responses to Mowing Practice and Nitrogen Fertility.
8. Hybrid and Nitrogen Source Effect on European Corn Borer Damage and Yield.
9. A Heat-sum Model to Determine Yield and Onset of Internal Heat Necrosis for 'Atlantic' Potato.
10. Agronomics of Land Application of Municipal Collected Shade Tree Leaves; II Soybean and Corn Production.
11. Physiological and biochemical responses of plants to drought and heat stress.
12. Morphological and physiological characteristics associated with heat tolerance in creeping bentgrass.
13. The influence of light period on carbon partitioning, translocation and growth in tomato.
14. Soil Physical Constraints and Plant Growth Interactions.
15. Cross species inoculation of Chewings and strong creeping red fescues with fungal endophytes.
16. Control of height and flowering of Ixia hybrids as container plants.

Genomics and Biotechnological Improvement of Plants

The Department of Plant Biology and Plant Pathology is committed to building on its existing strengths in genomics, proteomics, and informatics. The research programs highlighted here provide a sampling of both established and recently added research programs.

1. The use of endophytes to improve turfgrass performance.
2. Molecular markers and inheritance of fungal resistance in turfgrass.
3. Functional genomics; homologous meiotic recombination analysis in maize.
4. Oxygen signal transduction.
5. Satellite and defective RNAs of Cryhonectria hypovirus 3.
6. Transgenic plants, gene isolation and gene characterization.
7. Molecular genetics of leaf morphogenesis and development; genomics; tools for manipulating gene expression in Arabidopsis.
8. Extracellular enzyme production and biological control activity in Stenrophomonas maltophilia Strain 3.
9. Caspases and programmed cell death in the hypersensitive response of plants to pathogens.
10. A receptor serine kinase involved in the regulation of the plant defense response.
11. The cystathionine-g synthase gene involved in methionine biosynthesis is highly expressed and during wild strawberry (Fragaria vesca L.) fruit ripening.
12. Engineering the plastid genome.
13. A nontoxic pokeweed antiviral protein mutant inhibits pathogen infection without ribosome binding.
14. A transit peptide of a chloroplast thylakoid membrane is fully equivalent to a stromal-targeting sequence.
15. Overproduction of ascorbate peroxidase in the tobacco chloroplast does not provide protection against ozone.
16. Gene amplification technology using a regulatory sequence isolated from the untranslated intergenic region of tobacco ribosome DNA.

Cellular and Plant Physiology

The research programs highlighted here provide a sampling of both established and recently added research programs. The principal investigators and their many collaborators elsewhere are making important impacts in their respective areas:

1. Enhanced Somatic Embryo Production by Conditioned Media in Cell Suspension Cultures of Daucas carota.
2. Effect of carbon dioxide treatment on pollen germination and fruit set in cocoa.
3. Temperature and photoperiod influence trichome density and sesquiterpene content of Lycopersicon hirsutum f. hirsutum.
4. Daminozide inhibits ethylene production in apple fruit by blocking the conversion of methionine to aminocyclopropane-1-carboxylic acid (ACC).
5. Vegetative and flowering responses of mimulus to photoperiod and temperature.
6. Evaluation of an energy storage module as the primary heat source for greenhouse production of bedding plants.
7. Effect of gynoecium excision on auxin-mediated promotion of petal senescence in cut carnation flowers.
8. Promotion of floral longevity by the ovary in carnation flowers.

Greenhouse Crop Management

The mission of the greenhouse crop management and research team is to develop new technology for crop management, crop protection, and greenhouse environmental control. The goal is to improve greenhouse vegetable production efficiency and marketability, in a sustainable, environmentally safe production system.

The research programs highlighted here provide a sampling of both established and recently added research programs. The principal investigators and their many collaborators elsewhere are making important impacts in their respective areas:

1. Maintaining constant root environments in floating hydroponics to study root-shoot relationships.
2. Coordinated management of daily PAR integral and carbon dioxide for hydroponic lettuce production.
3. Electric energy consumption and PPFi output of nine 400 watt high pressure sodium luminaires and a greenhouse application of the results.
4. Solar Energy in Greenhouse Environmental Control.
5. Finite Difference Model of Phase Change Thermal Storage.
6. Reports and Recommendations on Construction of Quarantine Greenhouse Facilities for National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources.
7. Growth and development of Aquilegia in relation to temperature, photoperiod and seed vernalization.
8. Morphological responses of bedding plants to three greenhouse temperature regimes.
9. Mathematical modeling; instrumentation; control for controlled environmental agriculture.

Population and Organismal Biology

The research programs highlighted here provide a sampling of both established and recently added research programs. The principal investigators and their many collaborators elsewhere are making important impacts in their respective areas:

1. Evolution and natural history of the order Gentianales, including Gentianaceae (gentians), Loganiaceae (strychnine family), and Gelsemiaceae (Carolina jessamine family)
2. Historical biogeography of tropical America
3. GIS-based analysis of biogeography, phylogeny, and environmental constraints in South America, using Gentianaceae as a case study
4. Systematics and biogeography of tribe Helieae (Gentianaceae), including Chelonanthus
5. Taxonomy of the anti-malarial plant Tachia (Gentianaceae) in South America
6. Systematics of Strychnos (Loganiaceae); a toxic genus with worldwide distribution
7. Using parsimony as a tool for vegetation ecology studies
8. Medicinal plants of Central Asia, particularly Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan
9. Discovery of new species in Macrocarpaea and Symbolanthus, as well as other gentians
10. Taxonomy of Leea (Leeaceae/ Vitaceae) in Southeast Asia
11. Evolution in Clavicipitaceae (Ascomycetes)
12. Fungal-plant symbiotic interactions
13. Defense of grasses using plant endophytes

Natural Plant Product Research

The Program in Natural Plant Products has four major thrusts. First, to identify new compounds with unique biological activity or industrial uses from traditional and nontraditional food crops with the long term goal of developing new value-added products for human health or industrial applications (fragrances, flavorings, unique oils). Secondly, to metabolically engineer plants for altered secondary products with specific focus on caffeic acid derivatives and phenylpropanoids in aromatic and medicinal plants. Third, to develop new crops and enhance current crops and natural products through breeding for targeted natural products and the introduction of such new crops into commercial agriculture. Lastly, to develop quality control programs for botanicals.

Agribusiness in Sustainable Native African Products (ASNAPP) helps create and develop successful African businesses in the natural products sector providing income, employment and development, through environmentally and socially conscious sustainable production of high quality, healthful natural products for local, regional overseas markets.

The research programs highlighted here provide a sampling of both established and recently added research programs. The principal investigators and their many collaborators elsewhere are making important impacts in their respective areas:

1. Systematic occurrence of sterols in Araceae: subfamily Colocasioideae.
2. Systematic occurrence of anastomosing laticifers in Araceae.
3. Detection of phytotoxic compounds using stress-induced ethylene and ethane.
4. Characterization of essential oil of parsley.
5. Prostaglandin inhibitors and the development of mung bean seedlings.
6. Eliciting, collecting and characterizing pharmacologically active natural products.
7. Biochemical and molecular aspects of salicylic acid biology may result in the development of environmentally friendly alternatives to pesticide use.
8. Chaunopycnis pustulata sp. nov., a new clavicipitalean anamorph producing metabolites that modulate potassium ion channels.
9. In Vitro Culture and the Production of Secondary Metabolites in Eschscholtzia.
10. Integrated Bioreactor Operation in Secondary Metabolism. In: Plant Cell and Tissue Cultures: Towards Industrial Application.

Plant Protection and Management

The plant protection and management research is dedicated to an integrated approach to developing, fostering, and supporting effective, economical management of agricultural pests (insects, weeds, diseases, nematodes, and vertebrates) and the rational use of pesticides within the context of sound ecological principles and social realities. This effort is essential for maintaining agricultural sustainability, environmental quality, and adequate supplies of agricultural products.

Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is a strategy that utilizes all appropriate control methods (both chemical and non-chemical) to keep pest populations below economically damaging levels while minimizing detrimental impacts to the environment. Because the foundation to a successful IPM program is accurate identification of a potential pest, our objective here is to provide information aids that can help identify pests and determine if their level is economic.

The research programs highlighted here provide a sampling of both established and recently added research programs. The principal investigators and their many collaborators elsewhere are making important impacts in their respective areas:

1. Take-all patch control on bentgrass in relation to manganese and copper nutrition.
2. Phylogenetic relationships within and between Epichloe and Neotyphodium endophytes as determined by AFLP markers and rDNA sequences.
3. Suppression of summer patch by rhizosphere competent bacteria and their establishment on Kentucky bluegrass.
4. Application of DMI fungicides to turfgrass with three delivery systems.
5. Bacterial leaf scorch: a wide-spread problem of economic concern to the Urban Forest.
6. Pest Control Recommendations for Shade Trees and Commercial Nursery Crops.
7. The mycorrhizal endosymbiosis.
8. Phenology of the mummy berry fungus and its blueberry host: Implications for resistance breeding.
9. Phenotypic differences in apothecium development for populations of Monilinia vaccinii-corymbosi.
10. Variation and heritability of phenology in fungus Monilinia vaccine-corymbos on blueberry.
11. Identification of epiphyllous mycelial nets on leaves of grasses infected by clavicipitaceous endophytes.
12. Genotype responses and plant characteristics associated with dollar spot resistance in creeping bentgrass.

Chemical Control of Diseases

Control of plant diseases is achieved by utilizing numerous cultural, biological, regulatory and chemical tactics. The performance of a chemical is enhanced by utilizing non chemical tactics to reduce inocula. Also, within chemical control, numerous variables influence the performance of the chemical. Time of applications, nozzle arrangement, spray dilution, chemical rate per unit area, adjuvants, and rainfall are some of the variables associated with chemical application technology. Beginning spray programs prior to or at first sign of disease are best. Starting a spray program when disease is visible through the windshield of a moving vehicle costs less initially but often results in substandard yields and quality.

Horticultural/Plant Agriculture Program

The initiative is under the supervision of an organizing committee consisting of Dr. James White, Chair, and committee members: Drs. Richard Merritt, Daniel Rossi and Jerome Frecon. The initiative is expected to include over fifty-three research faculty, extension specialists along with over fifty eight county agents and consultants.

Interdepartmental programs will support, enhance and expand the horticultural industries in New Jersey, which will encompass all of the fruit, vegetable, flower, nursery and landscape crops grown in the state. The program expects to develop the research, education and outreach efforts of Cook/NJAES through three mechanisms: i. Annual “Future of NJ Horticulture Workshop; ii. A competitive grants program; iii. A scholarship and financial support program for undergraduate and graduate students specializing in horticulture.

Sports Turf Management Research

The turf management research is an inter-disciplinary effort aimed at initiating investigations, conducting research and disseminating information related to turfgrass and ornamental horticulture. In so doing, the program strives to further the knowledge and understanding of turf management. The faculty seeks to provide students with the opportunity for a meaningful, experiential learning regarding the turf industry with technical support and solutions to current problems.

The program has made a serious commitment to management research for golf courses and athletic fields. The acclaimed team of faculty and private sector leadership participate in a series of continuing education programs for sharing their research and practical experience on how to implement best management practices for healthy turf and maintenance of first class golf course greens and athletic fields. The program provides both three-day athletic field construction and maintenance short course and a two-week athletic field management school.

Vegetable Pathology Research

The Rutgers program in vegetable pathology research focuses on the biology and management of fungal and nematode diseases of fresh and processing vegetables.

The Vegetable IPM Program is dedicated to developing and improving integrated pest management techniques and practices that will enhance vegetable production in the state of New Jersey. Program objectives are accomplished through the development and delivery of pest monitoring and field scouting programs, grant-funded research, and educational outreach. Recently, a search was conducted to hire another vegetable plant pathologist and we are in the process of getting him officially on board.

Plant Breeding Programs

The research programs highlighted here provide a sampling of both established and recently added research programs.

1. Apple and Peach Breeding Programs
2. Asparagus Breeding Program
3. Blueberry/Cranberry Breeding Program
4. Health and Medicinal Plants
5. Holly and Dogwood Breeding Program
6. Lily Breeding Program
7. Ornamental Nut Tree Breeding
8. Nursery Crop Breeding
9. Strawberry and Small Fruit Breeding Programs
10. Turf Program