Online Meeting with Talk on Portable NIR for Plant Phenotyping Reunites NY–NJ SAS Members

The New York and New Jersey Society of Applied Spectroscopy (SAS) has postponed its live meetings until the country gets back to a normal work schedule. In the interim, an online meeting schedule has been developed as a way to maintain the connection.

To kick off the new schedule, the The NY–NJ SAS regional section will continue to offer meetings online for all members who want to participate. To provide feedback or join the online meetings, please email Debbie Peru at debperu@outlook.com. A link to the webinar will be provided. SAS held an online meeting on April 29. Guest speaker Ugochukwu Ikeogu, a post-doctoral research associate at Cornell University (Ithaca, New York), discussed the use of low-cost portable near infrared (NIR) spectrophotometers for phenotyping and quality control testing for a range chemical and physical parameters in cassava root and ground powder. The title of his talk was “Portable NIRS: A Fresh Perspective in Cassava Phenotyping.”

Ikeogu is the project manager of the “VitisGen2” project in the horticulture section at Cornell University. He received his PhD from Cornell University in 2018 from the Section of Plant Breeding and Genetics. His research focused on high throughput phenotyping and genomics-assisted improvement in cassava.

Ugochukwu Ikeogu

Ikeogu developed a passion for phenotyping as a way to bridge the gap between advanced genomics technology and the need for more rapid and precise phenotyping for improving plant breeding, especially quantitative traits of plants. He initiated the rapid and field-based calibration and deployment of a portable visible and NIR (vis/NIR) spectrometer in line with strategies for genomic selection implementation in cassava. In his first post-doctoral appointment, he contributed to a pilot remote sensing effort using thermal and hyperspectral imaging, as well as transcriptomic and metabolomic profiling of stress responses in a model plant for a living surveillance to enhance national security (LiSTENS) initiative. Today, his research focuses on the adoption of new phenotyping and molecular marker tools for the improvement of wine, table, and raisin grapes under a multi-institutional research collaboration funded by the United State Department of Agriculture–National Institute of Food and Agriculture (USDA-NIFA) Specialty Crop Research Initiative.

The NY–NJ SAS regional section will continue to offer meetings online for all members who want to participate. To provide feedback or join the online meetings, please email Debbie Peru at debperu@outlook.com. A link to the webinar will be provided.