Federal Grant Award Summary

The University of Kentucky Research Foundation received a $299,492 Project Grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) program (CFDA 10.310), awarded June 1, 2026, with a completion date of May 31, 2028. This seed project will deliver research findings on the ecological and agricultural impacts of imported fire ants (IFA) expansion along their northward range boundary in the United States. The research will quantify how IFA invasion affects the abundance and diversity of crop pests and predatory insects, evaluate the net impacts on predation rates considering both direct pest suppression and indirect interference with natural enemies, and assess the degree to which these effects correlate with aphid mutualistic relationships and IFA colony density.

The project will produce comparative analyses distinguishing between newly invaded sites with minimal IFA colonies and heavily invaded sites with high IFA density, advancing knowledge of interspecies interactions involving one of North America's most economically and ecologically impactful invasive insects. By disentangling the positive and negative effects of IFA on pest management across different geographic contexts, the research will establish foundational data to support future AFRI-funded projects and inform pest management strategies as IFA continues expanding into new cropping systems and ecosystems.