Latest News

May 19, 2020

May 13, 2020

Olivia Richart is the recipient of the Outstanding Senior Award for the 2019-20 academic year in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences. The Outstanding Senior Award, sponsored by the College of Agricultural Sciences Alumni Society and the Coaly Society, honors the senior who best balances outstanding academics, extracurricular activities, work experience and communication skills. Candidates are selected based on resumes, grades, interviews and a short essay.

May 4, 2020

A $450,000 grant from the U.S. Agency for International Development’s Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Peanut Research will aid researchers in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences as they explore the potential to empower women farmers in northern Ghana through peanut production.

April 20, 2020

Deanna Behring, assistant dean and director of international programs in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences is a recipient of the college's Distinguished Alumni Award, an honor that recognizes alumni who have demonstrated excellence in career achievements and contributions to community and humanity.

April 14, 2020

Penn State Extension is connecting with Latinx agriculturists in essential food businesses to provide timely outreach and science-based education on farm production, food safety and workplace risk management.

March 5, 2020

Started in 2018, Global Guides is a seven-month professional development program for teachers in any discipline. It is a partnership between the World Food Prize Foundation, an international organization that recognizes achievements in food security, and "Global Teach Ag!" at Penn State, an initiative that aims to develop capacity in teachers for global impact in food, fiber and natural resources through youth development and education programming.

March 2, 2020

Through a memorandum of understanding with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the U.N. (FAO), David Hughes, Penn State professor of entomology and biology and creator of PlantVillage, an initiative to empower farmers with agricultural knowledge and technologies, is answering a UN call for a rapid response to the growing locust threat to East African crops. With U.N. support, he and his colleagues are fast-tracking the creation of a mobile app that locates and tracks the insects in order to assist in early warning and targeted spraying efforts.

January 30, 2020

In 2017 and 2018, Penn State hosted three young innovators as part of the Mandela Washington Fellowship. The fellowship empowers young African leaders through academic coursework, leadership training and network opportunities. The fellowship is the top program of the Young African Leaders Initiative, and past fellows have established records of accomplishment in promoting innovation and positive change in their organizations, institutions, communities and countries. These young leaders represent the diversity of Africa, including equal numbers of women and men, individuals with disabilities, and people from both urban and rural areas.

January 24, 2020

A technology that uses dielectric heating and radio frequency energy to destroy destructive pests lurking within wood products is closer to reaching the marketplace after a recent commercial trial at Penn State’s University Park campus.

January 23, 2020

A novel composite film — created by the bonding of an antimicrobial layer to conventional, clear polyethylene plastic typically used to vacuum-package foods such as meat and fish — could help to decrease foodborne illness outbreaks, according to researchers in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences. The antimicrobial lining of the film is comprised of a pullulan-based biopolymer produced from starch syrup during a fermentation process, which is already approved for use in foods. Development of the composite antimicrobial film is important because 76 million cases of foodborne illnesses occur each year in the U.S. alone, resulting in 300,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. NIFA helped supported this research.

October 29, 2019

October 25, 2019

A new three-year project that will pilot and scale locally viable and gender-responsive circular-economy solutions was launched on 24 September in Nairobi, Kenya.

October 21, 2019

Two graduate students from South Africa recently had the opportunity to expand their research, develop a mentorship network and increase multicultural fluency as a result of a strategic partnership between the Department of Plant Pathology and Environmental Microbiology in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences and the Forestry and Agricultural Biotechnology Institute (FABI) at the University of Pretoria.

October 9, 2019

A new strategic planning group at Penn State seeks to enhance engagement and continue to provide support to Pennsylvania’s Latinx agricultural community.

October 7, 2019

A nearly $4 million grant awarded to Penn State will support an interdisciplinary, multi-university team of researchers as they explore bacterial pathogens causing leaf spot diseases that are damaging valuable agricultural crops such as watermelon and pumpkin.

October 3, 2019

Penn State has introduced a new policy governing the process for designating and approving visiting scholars to the University, as well as the responsibilities of University personnel and departments who wish to host a visiting scholar.

October 1, 2019

Undergraduate students from the Penn State chapter of Engineers Without Borders have launched a collaboration with the Namutamba community in Uganda to improve the community’s access to potable water.

October 1, 2019

Cassidy Prince has learned a great deal about foodborne pathogens while working in the lab of Jasna Kovac, Penn State assistant professor of food science. She also has learned how gratifying it can be to pass what she has learned onto others.

September 25, 2019

Researchers unveil their app for climate-smart agriculture in conjunction with the UN Climate Action Summit

September 18, 2019

A novel use of a custom laser system — developed in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences eight years ago — allows researchers to see how soil organisms affect plant roots. The discovery has implications for future breeding of more resilient and productive crops, according to an international team of scientists.

September 12, 2019

A new way of measuring how relationships in a network change over time can reveal important details about the network, according to researchers at Penn State and the Korean Rural Economic Institute. For example, when applied to the world economy, the method detected the greatest amount of network change during 2008-09, the time of the global financial crisis.

September 11, 2019

A multi-institutional effort to document and digitize the historical population dynamics of arthropod parasites will draw on Penn State entomological expertise and collections.

September 11, 2019

A new study provides an updated picture of the prevalence of the sheep and goat plague virus (PPRV), a widespread and often fatal disease that threatens 80 percent of the world’s sheep and goats, in northern Tanzania.

September 3, 2019

Effie Smith recently spent two and a half months in a former sugar-cane laborer community in the Dominican Republic conducting in-depth interviews to uncover the sources of income of contemporary batey residents.

July 23, 2019

Sulav Paudel, a doctoral candidate in entomology and in international agriculture and development in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences, traveled to Washington, D.C., in June to participate in two conferences aimed at advancing international agriculture and rural development.

July 2, 2019

A two-week training on foodborne pathogen detection methods, focused on dairy, will help educators and government agencies in Ethiopia ensure the safety of dairy products in that country.

June 11, 2019

Viruses, spread through mosquito bites, cause human illnesses such as dengue fever, Zika and yellow fever. A new control technique harnesses a naturally occurring bacterium called Wolbachia that blocks replication of viruses and breaks the cycle of mosquito-borne disease, according to an international team of researchers.