Daily Program	Abstracts & Posters
Keynote Speaker	Keynote Symposium	Plant Contributed Papers
Saturday, June 15	Plenary Symposia	Animal Posters
Sunday, June 16	Animal Symposia & Workshops	Education Posters
Monday, June 17	Joint Workshop	Education Workshop
Tuesday, June 18	Plant Symposia & Workshops	Plant Posters
Wednesday, June 19	Animal Contributed Papers	Addendum Booklet

Wednesday, June 19

Daily Program-at-a-Glance

Wednesday, June 19

Commercialization of Transgenic Plants

Conveners: Robert Harriman, The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company, and Charles L. Armstrong, Monsanto Company

Transgenic crops have been the fastest adopted crop technology in recent history, growing from 1.7 million global hectares planted in 1996 to 160 million in 2011 (ISAAA Brief 43-2011). Millions of farmers in 29 countries worldwide have benefited from the technology. The path to commercialization, however, remains complex and expensive. In addition to reviewing the amazingly successful adoption of transgenic crops in modern agriculture, this symposium will also address the evolving regulatory process for bringing these traits to market. Case studies will range from the early broad acreage herbicide and insect resistant row crop traits, to more recent yield and stress traits (drought tolerance), traits targeted specifically for the biofuel industy (alpha-amylase corn), and finally a recent novel approach for herbicide-tolerant transgenic turfgrass that requires less mowing.

Abiotic and Biotic Stress Tolerance

Convener: Ramanjulu Sunkar, Oklahoma State University

Improving crop plants’ resistance to the biotic and abiotic stresses is a must in the wake of increasing human population and persistent reduction in crop yields due to these stresses. Plant stress tolerance is determined by proper spatial and temporal regulation of genes, producing optimal levels of response proteins. Such precision in gene expression involves transcriptional, posttranscriptional, translational and posttranslational regulations. Although much progress has been made in identifying genes that might play a critical role under stress, we are far from realizing the benefits of such discoveries at the field level, largely due to lack of thorough understanding of the complicated genetic mechanisms involved in this process. Recent discoveries in this area include investigating the role of microRNAs and their potential utility in improving stress tolerance. There are also exciting advances being made in the area of ABA, a plant stress hormone, sensing and signaling. This session will feature speakers engaged in dissecting biotic and abiotic stress tolerance using genetic, biochemical and molecular approaches and how those findings can be applied to improving biotic and abiotic stress tolerance of crop plants.

Genetic Improvement of Bioenergy Crops

Conveners: C. Neal Stewart, University of Tennessee, and Rongda Qu, North Carolina State University

Fossil fuels are currently the major energy source in the US, which is of limited supply. The current supply of bioenergy in the US is mainly limited to maize-grain-derived ethanol and biodiesel from oilseed crops, e.g., soybean. There is a great interest in exploring alternative renewable energy sources for the next generation of biofuels, which will likely necessitate the development of improved dedicated feedstocks that are not food/feed crops. Active research is being performed to genetically improve the quality of various crops as feedstocks for biofuel production. That includes lignin reduction of lignocellulosic materials for increased sugar yield, alteration of fatty acids in triacylglycerol for high quality of biodiesel, and many other approaches. Another advantage for using biofuels as an energy source is that it reduces CO2 emission and thus helps protect our environment. This symposium will focus on the latest progresses on genetic improvements and genomic studies of biofuel crops.