A woman surrounded by green plants holding a plant.

Prominent global change scientist joins crop sciences, plant biology at Illinois

Globally recognized as one of the most influential modern scientists, RIPE Deputy Director Lisa Ainsworth has been named Professor and C.A. Ewing Chair of Crop Physiology in the Department of Crop Sciences and the Department of Plant Biology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

2024 Clarivate Highly Cited Researchers in yellow text on a grey background. Three pictures of scientists (one man, two women) are in the middle of the page with the RIPE project logo at the bottom.

Three RIPE researchers recognized on 2024 ‘Highly Cited’ list

RIPE’s Steve Long, Tracy Lawson, and Elizabete Carmo-Silva were all selected to this year’s Clarivate Analytics Highly Cited Researchers list, meaning they rank in the top 1% of cited scientists in their fields in the last decade.

Two pictures side-by-side. The left picture is of Tracy Lawson in a lab coat taking a measurement. The right picture is Andrew Leakey smiling in an office.

NSF, international partners to invest nearly $10M in ASAP Global Center

RIPE principal investigators Tracy Lawson and Andrew Leakey have been selected to lead a new NSF-funded global center. The Alliance for Socially-acceptable & Actionable Plants (ASAP) will work to provide synthetic biology solutions to produce high-energy, water-use-efficient crops.

Carl Bernacchi kneeling next to a refrigerator full of plant samples.

Carl Bernacchi helping raise the bar for agriculture climate research at Illinois

A long-time Illinois scientist has helped raise the agriculture profile of the University of Illinois. Bernacchi’s leadership within the Agroecosystem Sustainability Center and its collaborative effort has proven valuable as the team tackles global climate issues.

A woman surrounded by green plants holding a plant.

For two decades, Ainsworth has helped shape climate change research at SoyFACE

Lisa Ainsworth, the head of the USDA ARS Global Change & Photosynthesis Unit at SoyFACE, has left an indelible mark on the advancement of crop resilience to climate change.

Petri dishes in a refrigerator with green leaf samples in them.

Reduced plant growth found in double mutants by RIPE researchers

RIPE researchers from Louisiana State University experimented with removing two proteins vital to photosynthesis from a plant to see how it would affect crop growth. Their findings were published in Frontiers in Molecular Biosciences.

An image of a woman smiling holding a red circle next to a plant and a computer monitor.

Researchers adopt approach for more ethical plant research

RIPE researchers at Lancaster University have adopted a technique rarely used in plant science to generate antibodies without sacrificing any animals. The work was detailed in a chapter of the recently released book, Photosynthesis: Methods and Protocols.

Andrew Leakey

Leakey named Michael Aiken Chair at Illinois

RIPE PI Andrew Leakey was recently named the Michael Aiken Chair at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He was asked to describe how the honors will affect his work and career.

Carl Bernacchi surrounded by a circle of light to represent an eclipse.

What can researchers learn about ecosystems and the environment during the total solar eclipse?

Scientists across the U.S. and Mexico are engaging in a one-day data-gathering operation to record how the 2024 total solar eclipse affects various aspects of life on Earth. RIPE's Carl Bernacchi and his colleagues will focus on atmospheric and ecosystem-scale responses to the eclipse. Bernacchi spoke with News Bureau life sciences editor Diana Yates about what is planned and how it fits into the bigger research effort.

Lauana Pereira de Oliveira

From São João dos Patos to international scientist: Lauana's journey in search of knowledge and transformation

A newspaper in Lauana Pereira de Oliveira's native Brazil wrote an article about her academic journey that has led to her becoming a member of the RIPE team!