Mohsen Mesgaran will receive the 2026 Award of Excellence in Agricultural Research Innovation-Mid Career from AgInnovation-West for advancing early detection of high‑risk invasive species and pests.
Ava-Rose Beech, a Ph.D. student in the Department of Plant Sciences, has been selected for the Bridge Scholars program by CANVAS, a group of three soil and agronomy societies.
Steve Fennimore and Kassim Al-Khatib received top honors at a recent meeting of the California Weed Science Society. Plus, three students, also from the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences, won awards.
Venkatesan Sundaresan won a $4.9-million grant from the Gates Foundation to develop money-saving seeds for Indian farmers. He's a distinguished professor in the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences.
UC Davis Plant Sciences students earned first-place oral and poster awards at the CANVAS annual meeting. Research focused on oak restoration and water-efficient wheat that still delivers strong yields and quality bread.
Rachel Spaeth and other scientists at UC Davis used modern genetic tools to reconstruct the family tree of plums bred by the legendary Luther Burbank. Their model is useful for plant breeders and people who manage seed banks.
Venkatesan Sundaresan and Imtiyaz Khanday, in the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences, were honored for world-changing work to create hybrid crops that clone themselves. This means farmers can use the plants' seed and still get high yields.
Early career scientists are wrapping up a summer of research in the PEAS program -- the Plant, Environmental and Agroecology Sciences Fellowship. Their work links their undergraduate academic studies with real-world problems in service to California farmers.
Ardeshir Damania has won the Frank N. Meyer Medal for Plant Genetic Resources. A longtime scientist collecting and evaluating wheat genetic resources, he became a research associate in the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences -- but not before saving the world's wheat genebank.
Graduate student Aileen Salas, in the UC Davis Department of Plant Sciences, will use her $3,000 grant from the Miller Plant Science Award to research ways to boost yield and fight pests in almond orchards.
