Research

Goal 

• Achieve preeminence in discovery and innovation to address global challenges in food, life and natural resource sciences.

Key Characteristics

• Basic research advancing its impact on the world.
• Leadership in interdisciplinary and collaborative research expanding the research footprint and impact on the frontiers of knowledge and applications.
• Innovative applications meeting challenging societal needs as a leading contributor toward advancing quality of life, livelihood and the environment.
• Global recognition for driving discovery toward solutions to challenges of food, life and natural resource systems.
• Accomplishments that raise the distinction, stature and world rankings of the College.
• Success in garnering significant investments from public and private entities at state, national and international levels, thus advancing the global visibility and competitiveness of the College.

Key Strategic Initiatives

• Drive discovery
  • Seek solutions that address challenges of food, life and dimensions of natural resource systems and the environment.
  • Conduct basic research that creates fundamental knowledge to broaden discovery pathways.
  • Enable data science and digital technologies for the next generation of decision-making for food, life science and agriculture.
• Address global challenges through discovery and innovation
  • Invest in people:
    • Promote leadership in interdisciplinary research to expand the College's research footprint and impact on the frontiers of knowledge and applications by facilitating connections and creative collaborations.
    • Champion accomplishments that raise the distinction, stature and world rankings of the College.
    • Recruit, retain and promote world-class faculty, staff and students.
    • Maximally engage the next generation of thinkers and problem-solvers to be future-ready through innovative graduate programs.
    • Empower a working and learning environment that welcomes, values, supports and promotes diversity, inclusion and equity for all persons.
• Modernize facilities and resources
  • Design and refresh facilities with people-centric designs that promote socialization within (and between) research groups.
  • Identify and invest in unique facilities that promote discipline convergence in addressing multifaceted research problems.
  • Plan new research workspaces for greater flexibility and adaptability.
  • Align resources to pivot to match new research needs.
• Create and leverage strategic alliances
  • Attract significant investments from public and private entities at state, national and international levels.
  • Identify and seek unconventional partners and alliances while remaining connected to current stakeholders.
• Conceive and develop disruptive frameworks and technologies for agriculture, food and life sciences
  • Engage in creative activities (e.g., Hackathons and Ag-Eng days) that hasten ideation and team formation.
  • Promote and recognize team efforts that expand the reach of agriculture and life science discovery.
• Promote an "ideation-to-outcomes" approach to science
  • Develop innovative applications in meeting challenging societal needs as a leading contributor toward advancing quality of life, livelihood and the environment.
  • Foster, recognize and reward entrepreneurship in research and graduate education.