New research! Danforth Center PI Erin Sparks & Bayer used the SMURF device to show that shorter corn plants have more flexible roots — helping them take wind damage at less than half the rate of conventional corn. Watch the SMURF in action 👇
Congratulations to Dr. Ashley Snouffer, the new Director of our Plant Transformation Facility! From cassava regeneration breakthroughs to pioneering work with emerging tools, her research is helping unlock the future of crop improvement.
Danforth Center scientists are co-authors on a landmark study published today in @nature.com: the 1st comprehensive sorghum pangenome. Breeding better sorghum has been limited by an incomplete picture of its genetic diversity—until now.
https://www.danforthcenter.org/news/global-sorghum-pangenome/
901 curious minds showed up for PlantTech Jam 2026 to connect with Danforth Center scientists. Thanks to you, we had a blast! See the highlights and photos from the day: https://www.danforthcenter.org/news/planttechjam/
Nadia Shakoor, PhD, has been selected to receive the inaugural Innovation Award from the Academy of Science – St. Louis! Nadia is a principal investigator at the Danforth Center and the Chief Science Officer of Agrela Ecosystems, a St. Louis–based technology company. Congratulations, Nadia! 🎉
Danforth Center Scientist Antonio Brazelton's research on heirloom collard greens at JJK FAN is blending community, culture, & science in powerful ways. 🥬
Watch to see how: https://www.danforthcenter.org/news/hec-media-cultivating-a-better-collard-green/
#plantscience #collardgreens #urbanfarming
Very excited for this to dataset to contribute to a growing interest in understanding macroalgae evolution! 🥳
I don't know how the US will recover from the effect this will have on an entire generation of early career researchers. Devastating.
Preprint!!!! This is the result of an ongoing collaboration between us and the genomics core to make genetics cheap and easy. A synergy between library prep and analytical approaches. This one hinges on recognizing 1. that DNA molecules are shaped by evolution and 2. we have friends everywhere.
Keely Brown
Donald Danforth Plant Science Center
Donald Danforth Plant Science Center
Donald Danforth Plant Science Center
Donald Danforth Plant Science Center
Donald Danforth Plant Science Center
Donald Danforth Plant Science Center
Keely Brown
Keely Brown
Video
Brian Dilkes
Lodging is a major contributor to decreased yield in tef, a staple cereal crop in Ethiopia. Semidwarf varieties have been developed with a goal to increase yield through reduced lodging, but studying....
Danforth Center scientists publish a sorghum pangenome in Nature, revealing hidden genetic diversity to accelerate breeding of drought- and heat-resilient crops.
Quantifying growth and lodging in Tef (Eragrostis tef) with UAS. New preprint with @keelybrownphd.bsky.social @kmurphyphd.bsky.social and others, using geospatial analysis in @plantcv.bsky.social to estimate plot height and lodging with RGB and LiDAR sensors www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
Noah Fahlgren
Our new article on sugar kelp genomics across western Iceland is now out. We find substructure across a North-South and inner- to outer-bay gradient. SNP association with key environmental variables suggest local adaptation and/or density dependent selection is having an effect.
rdcu.be/ffacn
2/10
Life, the universe, and everything for $42: ultra-low pass sequencing of maize for genotyping, mapping, and pedigree analysis https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.64898/2026.02.20.707111v1
Áki Jarl Láruson
Lodging is a major contributor to decreased yield in tef, a staple cereal crop in Ethiopia. Semidwarf varieties have been developed with a goal to increase yield through reduced lodging, but studying ...
