News

Spring 2024 Newsletter

Seth Naeve and Aaron Lorenz were two of the speakers at a Field Day event for Lallemand Plant Care which was hosted by the University.  

Despite a weird wet spring we have seedlings coming up in the research plots on the St. Paul campus! 

Planting out started in earnest yesterday with grad student soybean projects getting started in the morning and by the afternoon we were planting in the crossing blocks.  Today Sonia Bolvaran did some hand planting in the field during some exceptionally beautiful weather (seen here).  

Mjay Espina, PhD student, and Lucas Roberts, PhD student, were awarded the President's Student Leadership and Service Award which recognizes the accomplishments and contributions of outstanding student leaders at the University of Minnesota.  

Lucas Roberts, Ph.D. candidate in the Applied Plant Sciences (APS) program (advisor, Aaron Lorenz) and Carlos Sanchez, a master’s student in APS (advisor, Seth Naeve) gave talks at a luncheon describing their experiences as 2022 recipients of the C. Jerry Nelson International Fellowship.  They both worked at the Agricultural Research Institute (INIA Chile) near Santiago, Chile, for three weeks in 2023.  Lucas was researching virus pressure on beans and Carlos researched soybean development.

Mjay Espina, graduate student, won first place for her poster "Assembly, comparative analysis, and utilization of a single haplotype reference genome for soybean" at the 2024 Soybean Breeders Workshop in St. Louis, MO. 

The Soybean Research Center held a Lightning Talk and Networking event on January 26th, 2024, highlighting 7 researchers and their recent work...

In this special cross-over episode, CropCast hosts Dave Nicolai and Seth Naeve visit with three talented graduate students who work on Soybean Research Center related projects...

At the recent University of Minnesota Soybean Research Center Field Day, Pedro Urriola and his dedicated team of researchers unveiled the results of four significant projects, shedding light on the future of livestock nutrition, sustainability, and disease prevention. These studies promise to reshape our understanding of soybean utilization, livestock production, and environmental impact assessment.

Minnesota Invasive Terrestrial Plants and Pests Center featured two of our members, Bob Koch and Aaron Lorenz and the work they are doing to try to combat soybean pests from multiple angles.  Read the article here. 

Rachel Vann, Soybean Extension Specialist, visited us from NCSU to talk about two exciting collaborative structures that are helping to get more done in the soybean arena; Science for Success and the N.C. Plant Sciences Initiative.

AGWEEK covered the Field Day we held on August 31, 2023.  You can read the story here. 

Collaborating researchers showcase field trials for farmers and stakeholders.

Standing in the crop research fields near the St. Paul campus, University of Minnesota researchers and students shared their latest collaborative efforts to improve soybean production...

Lucas Roberts- Ph.D. candidate in the Lorenz Soybean Lab, won a ribbon in Crop Art at the 2023 Minnesota State Fair. He used only soybeans originating from the UM Breeding Program. This was his first attempt at Crop Art....

Seth Naeve, co-director of the Soybean Research Center here at the University of Minnesota attended the Coordinated Soybean Centers meeting in Indianapolis this past July...

Soybean Research Center's Second Annual Spring Social/Networking Event
Friday, April 28 starting at 3:30 pm on the Borlaug Hall (South) Patio, or in 306 Borlaug in case of rain (or snow!)
Stop by anytime until ~5:30 for food, drinks, and conversation with fellow UMN soybean researchers!

Bus trip through southern Minnesota delivers value across many UMN departments that work to improve soybeans.

Co-hosted by the UMN Soybean Research Center, APG seminar speaker Dr. Don Ort (University of Illinois) will give a talk "Engineering Photosynthesis for Increased Yield" on Thursday, Nov. 17 at 2:30 PM in 105 Cargill.