Project Grant 200851180195971

This federal Project Grant award from the Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (CFDA No. 10.329 - Crop Protection and Pest Management Competitive Grants Program) provides $323,989 to the University of Florida to develop and implement a push-pull technology system to mitigate the spread of whitefly infestation in vegetable crops like cucurbits and tomatoes. The key products and services to be delivered under this 3-year grant include: 1) determining the most...

This $325,000 Project Grant awarded by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Crop Protection and Pest Management Competitive Grants Program (CFDA 10.329) will develop new tools and approaches to better predict and manage fungal foliar diseases in major crops like corn, soybeans, and potatoes. The project will use a combination of low-cost air sampling devices, weather monitoring stations, and DNA sequencing to track disease-causing organisms. This data will be used...

This $5,953,802 Project Grant award from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Specialty Crop Research Initiative (SCRI) program funds a multi-institutional effort led by New Mexico State University to develop an integrated, system-based approach to significantly reduce the risk of Phytophthora blight in vegetable crops like peppers and cucurbits. The project aims to: 1) evaluate genetic diversity of the causal agent Phytophthora capsici, 2) identify resistant crop genotypes tolerant to...

This $836,100 federal Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's Integrative Activities program (CFDA 47.083) aims to enhance understanding of the genetic mechanisms underlying the bacterial wilt disease that affects cucurbit crops like cucumbers and melons. The key objectives are to screen and characterize disease resistance traits in diverse cucumber and melon populations, and leverage this knowledge to develop sustainable management strategies for this critical agricultural...

This Project Grant award from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) program provides $998,051 to North Carolina State University to develop an early detection system for downy mildew, a devastating plant disease affecting cucurbit crops like cucumbers and pumpkins. The project aims to create a portable test for identifying disease spores and a robotic system to automatically...

This $180,000 Project Grant awarded by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) program supports research to understand how the bacterial wilt pathogen Ralstonia solanacearum survives in water. The University of California, Davis is conducting high-throughput genetic screening to identify the genes that enable this pathogen to persist in aquatic environments, with the goal of developing new management strategies to...

This $323,001 Project Grant awarded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (CFDA 10.329 - Crop Protection and Pest Management Competitive Grants Program) aims to develop an integrated pest management system to address the emerging Tomato Brown Rugose Fruit Virus (TOBRFV) threat to the $2 billion U.S. tomato industry. The key products and services to be delivered include: 1) Evaluating the efficacy of chemical disinfectants and cold plasma ozone...

The National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) awarded North Carolina State University a $300,000 Project Grant under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) competitive grants program. The three-year grant will fund research and outreach to develop a sustainable pest management program for the western flower thrips (WFT), a major pest of tomatoes and peppers in the Southeastern U.S. that has developed resistance to insecticides. Specifically, the university will work to...

This Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Biological Sciences program provides $500,000 from March 2024 through February 2027 to researchers at the University of Maryland and Silvec Biologics, Inc. to develop methods to stabilize RNA genomes in viruses that can be used as therapies to treat plant diseases. The project aims to use computational approaches, including artificial intelligence, to design RNA structures that can be inserted into virus genomes to increase...

The University of Georgia Research Foundation, Inc. was awarded a $4,790,065 Project Grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture under the Specialty Crop Research Initiative (CFDA 10.309) to address the threat of anthracnose disease in watermelon and cucumber crops. The project aims to improve understanding of anthracnose pathogens, screen crops for resistance, and develop sustainable management strategies. Key sub-awardees include the USDA...