Navdeep Kaur, a second-year graduate student at New Mexico State University, has been selected by the National Association of Plant Breeders to join a competitive scholarship program that promotes professional development through mentorships with scientists working to advance the plant-breeding field.

Kaur, who is majoring in agronomy with a concentration in plant breeding and genetics and minoring in applied statistics, is part of a cohort of 20 graduate students from across the United States picked to participate in the 2023 NAPB Borlaug Scholars Program.

The program aims to develop the next generation of leaders in the plant-breeding field. It pairs participants like Kaur with volunteer mentors from the National Association of Plant Breeders for a yearlong professional development mentorship experience. It also provides financial support for participants to attend the organization's annual meeting this month in Greenville, South Carolina.

Kaur, who came to the U.S. from India, is the first student from NMSU selected for the program.

At NMSU, Kaur works on research with her adviser, Dennis Nicuh Lozada, director of NMSU's Chile Breeding and Genetics Program, to identify genomic loci linked to Phytophthora root rot resistance in chile peppers and perform marker validations and genomic predictions.

Phytophthora root rot is a major issue in chile pepper production across the Southwest, and Kaur's research seeks to develop cultivars resistant to the disease, using genome-wide mapping, genomics selection and other genomic tools.

"Navdeep came into the program almost two years ago, and she's been an excellent student," Lozada said. "She's been hardworking and eager to learn the new technologies we're using in our studies, specifically on chile peppers and the trait she's looking at."

Kaur will present her research findings at the upcoming conference. In addition to research presentations, the four-day conference will also feature interactive workshops, tours of research farms and crop operations, and networking activities.

Kaur said she is looking forward to meeting other plant-breeding researchers through the yearlong NAPB program. She's also eager to work with her mentor, a computational biologist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and further her interest in computational biology.

"My mentor has been really supportive of me and generous with career advice," Kaur said. "I am excited to meet and introduce myself to industry and academic leaders and learn about their work at the conference."

Kaur expects to complete her master's program in December and plans to pursue a Ph.D. in plant breeding and genetics. She said she intends to focus her career on developing crops that can withstand various environmental stressors and improving food security worldwide.

The full article can be seen at https://newsroom.nmsu.edu/news/nmsu-graduate-student-selected-for-national-plant-breeding-scholars-program/s/07f74039-072f-44e7-b8b1-eebfee1d2144