Skip to main content
ARS Home » Northeast Area » Beltsville, Maryland (BARC) » Beltsville Agricultural Research Center » Molecular Plant Pathology Laboratory » People » L. DAVID KUYKENDALL
L. DAVID KUYKENDALL
headline bar

Phone: 301-504-7072Dr. Kuykendall

Dr. L. David Kuykendall serves as a Horticulturalist investigating the complex interactions of sugar beets, Beta vulgaris, with pathogenic micro-organisms.


 

 

 

 BAC carrying core plant genes NPR1, Calmodulin-binding protein, Casein kinase and Heat shock factor.

 

 Enlarge Photo

    

 


Cercospora infected leaf

Sugar beets currently supply about half of the United States' sugar (sucrose), and when processed it is of course identical to that of sugarcane. The thrust of this program is to control disease and/or improve disease resistance to microbial pathogens using genetic modification.
Enlarge Photo

 



Resistant plant

Targeted are bacteria, namely, Erwinia (or Pectobacterium) betavasculorum that causes root rot disease and fungi, specifically, Cercospora beticola that causes leaf spot disease.
Enlarge Photo



AFLP

A better understanding of the molecular basis for both disease resistance and pathogenesis is being sought using molecular approaches including but not limited to genomics. Transgenic plants are employed to look at potential new mechanisms of effective disease prevention.
Enlarge Photo



healthy California field

It is anticipated that this research will lead to environmentally safe and economically feasible control of sugar beet diseases in order to increase the profitability of sugar beet production in the United States.
Enlarge Photo