Environmental Physiology of Subtropical & Tropical Crops Staff
Bruce Schaffer, Professor
Bruce's research focuses on environmental physiology, primarily of subtropical and tropical crop plants. He supervises postdoctoral associates, biologists, technicians, and graduate students studying plant physiology and tropical horticulture in the Department of Horticultural Sciences at the University of Florida. He is also involved in several collaborative research and editing projects with colleagues at other institutions in the U.S. and abroad.
Chunfang "Daisy" Li, Senior Biologist
Daisy received a B.S. degree in Crop Science and an M.S. degree in Crop Physiology from Hunan Agricultural University in Changsha, China. Prior to working at TREC, she worked as a Senior Editor, Journalist, and Visiting Scientist at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing. Prior to that she was a Lecturer at Hunan Agricultural University.
Marcelo Schramm Mielke, Visiting Professor
Macelo is Professor from the State University of Santa Cruz in Ilheus, Brazil. He teaches and conducts research in the areas of ecophysiology of subtropical and tropical tree species and agroforestry systems. He is on a one-year sabbatical to study flooding x light intensity effects on Eugenia uniflora.
Michael Gutierrez, Biologist
Michael is a Florida State University graduate with a B.S. in biological sciences. He is currently working in Dr. Kati Migliaccio's program on several water resources engineering projects focusing on irrigation and water quality. In Bruce Schaffer's lab he continues to work on two projects in cooperation with the USDA-ARS (Atmospheric Transport of Agricultural Chemicals, and Protecting Ground and Surface Water from Agricultural Chemicals in Florida's South Dade Basin). He is also assisting with assessing foliar acid applications for reducing iron deficiency of tropical fruit trees and studying the influence of soil water content on re-establishment of Amorpha herbacea var. crenulata in a native pine rockland.
Clfford Martin, Graduate (Ph.D.) Student
Cliff received a B.S. degree in Ornamental Horticultural from Florida A&M University, an M.S. degree (non-thesis) in Entomomolgy from the University of Arizona and an M.S. degree (thesis) in Entomology from the University of Florida. He began working toward his Ph.D. degree in Entomology in the Fall of 2004 under the joint supervision of Dr. Catharine Mannion, an Assistant Professor of Entomology and Dr. Schaffer. Cliff's research project involves studying the effects of flooding and adult and larval feeding of Diaprepes root weevil on physiology and growth of tropical ornamental plants.
Mark Nickum, Graduate (Ph.D.) Student
Mark graduated with his B.A. degree in Biology from Knox College. Upon graduating, he worked at the herbarium at Missouri Botanical Garden and developed an interest in ethnobotany. He received his Master's degree in Botany at the University of Hawaii, Manoa. His MS research documented the ethnobotany and construction of a 108 foot long sailing and voyaging canoe in the South Pacific island nation of Tonga. While in Hawaii, Mark became interested in tropical fruit, which brought him to the University of Florida to pursue a Ph.D. degree in Horticulture. Currently Mark is working on testing flood and drought stress tolerance of mamey sapote (Pouteria sapota).