Mary Machingura worked at Louisiana State University as a postdoctoral researcher on the RIPE project. Mary’s research is focused on improving drought tolerance and investigating hormonal control in abiotic stress responses. She helped identify genes that code for proteins that enhance carbon dioxide delivery to Rubisco. Mary earned her bachelor's degree in agriculture and natural resources from Africa University, and went on to get her master's degree from Wageningen University and Research Centre. She went on to conduct research for the Plant Food Safety Project at Southern Illinois University, where she earned her doctorate in plant biology. Her work has appeared in Plant Science, Plant Physiology and Biochemistry, and other scientific journals.