a photo of two pieces of Dr. Alan Windham's ornamental disease collection on display

Alan Windham’s End of the Road World Tour

    For many years, Dr. Alan Windham has provided leadership for educational programs in diseases affecting ornamental plants. Recently, Windham traveled to Knoxville to display his extensive ornamental disease collection to students enrolled in EPP 410, Diseases and Insects of Ornamental Plants. Other students, staff, and faculty that were interested in viewing his collection were also invited. His colleague, Dr. Mark Windham, stated that the “collection is without peer in North America, perhaps the word”. As this was the last time he would be setting up his display for the class, students were appreciative of the opportunity to view such a huge collection.

a hand holding a Colorado potato beetle

Student Spotlight: Swati Mishra

  After receiving her undergraduate degree in Biotechnology in India, Swati joined the department as a master’s student. However, time has flown since then. Swati is now a third-year Ph.D. student with a concentration in Bioinformatics, Genomics, and Molecular Interactions. With her course requirements being complete, she is now entirely focused on her research. Therefore, you will usually find her working in the Jurat-Fuentes Lab throughout the day. While in the lab, you can find her working through her research question, “What mechanisms are involved in resistance against insecticidal double-stranded RNAs (dsRNAs) in Colorado potato beetle”. “Double-stranded RNAs are the latest class of insecticides that act by silencing important insect genes via RNA-interference (RNAi) pathway.” She explained that one of