Joshua Haslun is an Analyst on the Agro Innovation team at Lux Research. In this role he monitors and evaluates emerging and innovative agricultural technologies from sectors including crop genetic improvement, precision agriculture, and soil microbiome management to drive future innovations, while navigating challenging regulatory frameworks.
Joshua has extensive experience across numerous scientific disciplines including quantitative genomics and transcriptomics, immunology, isotope systematics, and microbial ecology. Prior to joining Lux, Joshua was a Research Associate for the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center at Michigan State University, where he developed methods to apportion nitrogen losses among diverse soil microbial processes, fostering soil microbiome management methods to improve biofuel feedstock production.
Joshua obtained a dual-degree Ph.D. in Integrative Biology and Ecology, Evolutionary Biology, and Behavior from Michigan State University and has contributed more than 13 publications to top peer-reviewed journals on diverse subjects. He also holds a B.S. in Biology from Siena College, and an M.S. in Biology specializing in Marine Science from Texas A&M University - Corpus Christi.
Biography Coming Soon
Dr. Paul Ulanch is the Executive Director of the Crop Commercialization Program at the North Carolina Biotechnology Center where he facilitates value-add opportunities to improve crops that result in increased profits for NC growers and strengthens the state’s agribusinesses. Many projects add value to the greater Southeast. Current project work is pursuing increasing feed grain production in the Mid-Atlantic region to sustain North Carolina’s production animal industry, optimize parameters for growing cellulosic biomass grasses to sustain a high-value chemicals industry, scale the use of winter oilseeds as a way to improve wheat production and attract specialty oil markets, and explore niche specialty crops that can be deployed at scale for food ingredients. He served as the Enterprise & Technology Development Director where he led efforts to support ag biotech entrepreneurs, enable partnership development, and assist companies locating to North Carolina.
He received his Ph.D. in Biochemistry from Texas A&M University where he developed a process to accelerate construction of physical genome maps, and MBA from the Katz Executive Program at the University of Pittsburgh, with Beta Gamma Sigma honors. He served as Director of Technology Commercialization at the NC SBTDC and research faculty at the University of Pittsburgh’s School of Medicine, and consulted for and advised industry, commodity groups, and non-profits in areas of science, marketing, and intellectual property.
Melissa Johnson is the leader of Product Science & Technology at Corteva Agriscience. Her team is responsible for development, scale-up, launch and support of innovative formulated products and packaging to meet the needs of crop protection markets globally. She has over 20 years of research and leadership experience in formulations and formulation ingredients across industries, including Agriculture, Coatings, Personal Care, Consumer & Industrial Products and Microbial Control. Melissa leads several teams across Corteva R&D in the development and implementation of goals and metrics for sustainable innovation. She is a current member of the Board of Directors for the Council for Agricultural Science & Technology (CAST) and is on the organizing board for the AgChem conference. Melissa holds a Ph.D. in chemistry from Northwestern University.
With over 25 years of research management experience, Bob leads Vestaron’s molecular biology and chemistry development teams. Management positions in Fortune 500 companies (Pfizer), academic appointments (Columbia, Michigan) and start-ups add to the leadership and technical experience he brings to Vestaron’s Research and Development success.
Dr. Scott H. Jackson is Vice President of Regulatory and Regulatory Science for Vestaron Corporation in Research Triangle Park North Carolina. Vestaron is an Industry leader in peptide technology focused on bringing producers state of the art crop protection solutions. Scott received his B.S. degree in natural resources from Humboldt State University, his M.S. degree in soil science from Fresno State University, and his Ph.D. degree in environmental science from Union Institute.
With over 25 years of research and management experience roles at companies such as BASF, Valent and Knoell, he adds to the leadership and technical experience brought to Vestaron’s Regulatory and Regulatory Science team.
Bio coming soon!
The overall goal of Dr. Walse’s research is to ensure the protection and quality of foodstuffs in global distribution channels, as such, the main foci include food security, food safety, and agrochemical residues. Research results directly enhance production, distribution, and safety of foodstuffs, promote, and retain access of United States-grown crops to domestic and foreign markets, and protect the United States and trading partners from the agricultural, ecological, and economic threat posed by quarantine and invasive pests.
Bio coming soon!
Diane Allemang is Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer for FMC. She joined FMC in 2015 with the Cheminova acquisition. At Cheminova, she was Executive Vice President for North America. Ms. Allemang was with Cheminova for 14 years in various commercial and regulatory roles at the global and regional levels. Prior to that, she was a Vice President with the consulting firm of Jellinek, Schwartz & Connolly, Inc., where she managed the firm’s pesticide practice and advised clients on pesticide regulatory matters.
Ms. Allemang served as Chair of the CropLife America Board of Directors from 2015-2017, the first woman to do so in the association’s 80-year history.
She holds a B.A. in Economics from Stanford University.
Douglas Robinson is a Principal with the law firm of Harness IP with 16+ years of intellectual property law experience. He specializes in assisting companies in identifying potential IP assets, evaluating the proper form of protection for those assets, and managing their IP portfolios.
