On May 21, 2025 the Interdepartmental Plant Biology graduate students will host the Loomis Symposium.  This year's theme is "Plants and the Environment: Molecular to Systems Level".  
 

Featured speakers include:
Dr. Jian Hua (Cornell University) 
Loomis Lecture: "Regulation of immunity and thermos-response by a calcium and lipid binding protein BONZAI1 in Arabidopsis"

Dr. Anjali Iyer-Pascuzzi (Purdue University)
"Plant immunity across scales: from cells to space"

Dr. Maheshi Dassanayake (Louisiana State University) 
"Decoding Salt Resilience in Extremophytes Through a Multiscale Exploration from Cell to Species Level"

Short talks from graduate students include:

Matthew Wendt (Interdepartmental Genetics & Genomics Graduate student, Yandeau-Nelson Lab), "Quantifying the Environmental Factors and Genotype-by-Weather Interactions that Impact the Cuticular Waxes Protecting Maize Silks"

Vishadinie Jayasinghe (IPB Graduate student, Bassham Lab), "Unraveling the role of autophagy in maize abiotic stress responses"

Venkata Naresh Boddepalli (Agronomy Graduate student, Artie Singh Lab), "Genetic analysis of mungbean pod traits in Iowa Mung Bean Diversity Panel using image-based phenotyping"

The Symposium schedule can be downloaded here:  Schedule