Dr. Libo Shan has been appointed director of the Norman E. Borlaug Center Institute for Plant Genomics and Biotechnology, or IPGB, at Texas A&M University in College Station.

“We are pleased to have Dr. Shan in this leadership role as we continue to discover new, innovative technologies that help solve complex challenges,” said Dr. Patrick Stover, vice chancellor and dean of agriculture and life sciences at Texas A&M and acting director of Texas A&M AgriLife Research.

Dr. Libo Shan has been appointed director of the Norman E. Borlaug Center Institute for Plant Genomics and Biotechnology, or IPGB, at Texas A&M University in College Station.

“Dr. Shan will lead vibrant research teams within the institute and direct sustainable development of these facilities as coherent parts of the agricultural research community on and off campus at Texas A&M.”

The institute serves as host to 11 faculty research laboratories affiliated with seven different departments providing a plant growth facility, multi-crop transformation facility and lab for genomic technology. The facilities support AgriLife Research and the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

“IPGB will continuously lead the lane of research excellence in plant genomics and biotechnology as a flagship institution in Texas,” Shan said. “We will leverage our existing strength in foundational and translational research into a nationally and internationally competitive Center of Research Excellence in Science and Technology. IPGB will continuously foster a vibrant, collaborative and competitive cutting-edge research environment, and provide resources in equipment, technology and services.”

The mission of the center is to develop plant biotechnology, genomics and related life science technologies and to foster utilization and crop improvement through multidisciplinary research activities on model plant systems, field, forest and horticultural crops.

Shan earned her doctorate in plant pathology from Kansas State University and her post-doctorate at Harvard Medical School in Boston. She also earned a master’s in genetics from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in China and a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from Beijing Normal University.

Shan’s primary research interest lies in elucidating how the host-microbe interactions shape the evolution of microbial pathogenicity and plant immunity, and improving crop resilience to pests. Shan has received research funding support from the National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Welch Foundation and Cotton Incorporated.