Apples are an all-American success story-each of us eats more than 19 pounds of them annually. Thanks to fruit-breeding research, we're able to enjoy more productive, healthy, and flavorful new varieties every year. And we're collecting and preserving the world's bounty of apple genestock, so that the apples of tomorrow may be even sweeter crunchier, and better than ever.

The mission of the IR-4 Project is to facilitate regulatory approval of sustainable pest management technology for specialty crops and specialty uses to promote public well being. In this picture an IR-4 technician at the Temperate Tree Fruit and Vegetable Research Laboratory checks on an experiment.

We strive to develop new potato cultivars with superior pest and disease resistance, enhanced amounts of phytonutrients, and better quality that enhance food security, sustainability and protect profitability and jobs.

We study the chemical ecology of native and invasive insect pests such as the Asian Giant Hornet (Vespa mandarinia, bottom left) and are working to identify insect pheromones and other attractants that can be used to detect, monitor, and manage the insect pests.