Cornell University Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics

Research Interests:
Over the past decade, tremendous progress has been made in our understanding of crop genome organization, variation, and evolution, particularly as it relates to potential discovery and exploitation of useful diversity in plants. Critical to this progress has been advances in molecular biology/genetics, genomics, as well as thoughtful applications of the theories of evolutionary biology and plant breeding. It is well recognized that a crop genome is a dynamic unit whose organization and variation has been molded by evolutionary processes and human intervention.

My research objectives are: (1) to identify regions of the sorghum and maize genomes which have been fixed through evolution, domestication, or crop improvement and associate these selective sweeps with useful types and traits, (2) to characterize and understand the relationship between DNA sequence variation and desirable phenotype, (3) to identify both conserved sequences across grass/grain families and genera and rapidly evolving sequences between species and individuals to predict gene diversity and function, (4) to characterize molecular diversity of sorghum and maize in natural populations, landraces, and elite germplasm, and (5) to develop and test strategies to efficiently discover, conserve, and use variation in natural populations and genebank collections by integrating current advances in genomics, bioinformatics, and plant genetics/breeding. In support of Cornell University's commitment to global conservation and agricultural initiatives, I serve as Director of the Institute for Genomic Diversity.

In July 2005, I became the Cornell's Vice Provost for Life Sciences. In this position I am responsible to promote and administer the New Life Sciences Initiative, including the hiring of new faculty, planning for new buildings, developing shared core research facilities, and supporting educational and training activities based on Cornell's comprehensive investments in the life sciences.

Selected Publications:
Thuillet, A.C., L.K. Anderson, M.I. Tenaillon, S.E. Mitchell, S. Kresovich, S.M. Stack, B. Gaut, and J.F. Doebley. Submitted. Pattern of selection, recombination, and mutation from microsatellites in the maize and teosinte genomes. Genetics.

Gingle, A.R., Y. Huang, H. Yang, J. Bowers, S. Kresovich, and A.H. Paterson. Submitted. CGGC: an integrated web resource for sorghum. Plant Physiol.

Brown, P.J., P. Klein, E. Bortiri, C. Acharya, W.L. Rooney, and S. Kresovich. In press. Inheritance of inflorescence architecture in Sorghum. Theor. Appl. Genet. 113:931-942.

Casa, A.M., S.E. Mitchell, J.D. Jensen, M.T. Hamblin, A.H. Paterson, C.F. Aquadro, and S. Kresovich. 2006. Evidence for a selective sweep on chromosome 1 of cultivated sorghum. Plant Genome 1:S1-S15.

Hamblin, M.T., A.M. Casa, H. Sun, S.C. Murray, A.H. Paterson, C.F. Aquadro, and S. Kresovich. 2006. Challenges of detecting directional selection after a domestication bottleneck: lessons from Sorghum bicolor. Genetics 173:953-964.

Zhao, W., P. Canaran, R. Jurkuta, T. Fulton, J. Glaubitz, E. Buckler, J. Doebley, B. Gaut, M. Goodman, J. Holland, S. Kresovich, M. McMullen, L. Stein, and D. Ware. 2006. Panzea: a database and resource for molecular and functional diversity in the maize genome. Nucl. Acids Res. 34:D752-757.

Kresovich, S., A.M. Casa, A.J. Garris, S.E. Mitchell, and M.T. Hamblin. 2006. Improving the connection between effective crop conservation and breeding. In: Plant Breeding: Hallauer Symposium, pp. 90-96, Blackwell, Oxford.

Yu, J., G. Pressoir, W.H. Briggs, I.V. Bi, M. Yamasaki, J.F. Doebley, M.D. McMullen, B.S. Gaut, D.M. Nielsen, J.B. Holland, S. Kresovich, E.S. Buckler. 2006. A unified mixed-model method for association mapping that accounts for multiple levels of relatedness. Nat. Genetics. 38:203-208.

Feltus, F.A., G.E. Hart, K.F. Schertz, A.M. Casa, S. Kresovich, S. Abraham, P.E. Klein, P.J.Brown, A.H. Paterson. 2006. Alignment of genetic maps and QTLs between inter- and intraspecific Sorghum populations. Theor. Appl. Genet. 112:1295-1305.

Rice, E.B., M.E. Smith, S.E. Mitchell, and S. Kresovich. 2006. Conservation and change: a comparison of in situ and ex situ conservation of Jala maize germplasm. Crop Sci. 46:428-436.

© 2006 Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics, Cornell University