Faculty and students from the Texas A&M College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Department of Soil and Crop Sciences received national honors and recognition at the recent Science Societies international annual meeting in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Canvas 2025, the Science Societies conference, showcases oral and poster presentations as well as award presentations to members of the Crop Science Society of America, CSSA; the American Society of Agronomy, ASA; and the Soil Science Society of America, SSSA, and an undergraduate organization, Students in Agronomy, Soil and Environmental Sciences, SASES.

Fellow Awards are the highest recognition bestowed by each society. Members are nominated by colleagues based on their professional achievements and meritorious service.

American Society of Agronomy Fellows

  • Nithya Rajan, Ph.D., professor of agronomy and agroecology and director of the Center for Greenhouse Gas Management at Texas A&M, earned the Fellow title in both the American Society of Agronomy and the Crop Science Society of America. Her research focuses on advancing climate-smart strategies to promote sustainable agricultural practices.

Crop Science Society of America Fellows

  • Muthukumar Bagavathiannan, Ph.D., Billie Turner Professor of Agronomy, leads a research program in weed science and systems agronomy that integrates digital and precision technologies to improve efficiency.
  • Shuyu Liu, Ph.D., professor and wheat breeder in College Station, has been working on wheat genetics, genomics and breeding for more than 35 years. He has developed wheat germplasm lines and cultivars with resistance to various diseases and pests, and better quality.

Soil Science Society of America Presidential Award

  • Donald Sparks, Ph.D., Hagler Fellow in the Texas A&M Department of Soil and Crop Sciences and retired professor at the University of Delaware, has made major research contributions in the field of soil chemistry over a 45-year career, including the areas of kinetics of soil chemical processes, surface chemistry of soils, and environmental change impacts on cycling of metals and nutrients in soils.

Special Awards

Crop Science Graduate Student Scholarship

  • Christopher Cobos, doctoral candidate and a senior research associate at the Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Extension Center in Lubbock, earned the Crop Science Graduate Student Scholarship. His research focuses on soil water dynamics in regenerative agricultural production systems in semi-arid regions.

Crop Science Outstanding Journal Article

  • Andrea Leiva Soto, Texas A&M AgriLife Research postdoctoral research association, Amarillo; Steve W Culman, Christine Sprunger, and Douglas Doohan, all from The Ohio State University; and Catherine Herms, Washington State University, were recognize with a Society Outstanding Paper, in the Crop Management Section: “Managing Soil Acidity vs. Soil Ca:Mg Ratio: What Is More Important for Crop Productivity?”

Greenfield Scholar

  • Hallie Cook, a senior majoring in plant and environmental soil science, was recognized as a Greenfield Scholar. Throughout her undergraduate career, Cook completed three internships ranging from crop scouting to drone research to seed development. She currently serves as president of the Agronomy Society.

Gerald O. Mott Award

  • Joe Johnson was selected for the Gerald O. Mott Meritorious Graduate Student Award in Crop Science, which recognizes top-notch graduate students pursuing advanced degrees in crop science disciplines.

National Association of Plant Breeders Borlaug Graduate Scholar

  • Khushboo Rastogi was selected as a NAPB Borlaug Graduate Scholar. Borlaug Scholars will be paired with volunteer mentors who are professional NAPB members committed to the recipients’ professional development.

Quiz Bowl Team

The Agronomy Quiz Bowl team, represented by undergraduate plant and environmental soil science students Hallie Cook, senior; Reed Terrell, junior; Danny Roberts, senior; and Finn Gavranovic, senior, won first place in the SASES Quiz Bowl.

SASES has chapters from colleges and universities across the nation that offer curricula in agronomy, crops, soils and environmental sciences. The Quiz Bowl challenges students with quick wit and general agronomy, crops and soils knowledge.

Poster and oral competition awards

Graduate students competed in poster and oral presentation competitions in all three societies. The following is a list of students, their placements and areas of study.

  • Nick Boogades, first place poster/5-minute rapid talk – Soil Fertility, Plant Nutrition, Nutrient Management and Soil Plant Analysis; and first place oral presentation – Soil Carbon and Greenhouse Gas Emissions.
  • Ryan Hamberg, first-place oral presentation – Organic Management Systems, Outstanding oral presentation; first-place oral presentation – Weedy and Invasive Species.
  • Md Wasek Foysal, Joe B. and Martha Dixon Award; second-place oral presentation – Soil Mineralogy.
  • Chase Martin, first place oral competition – Turfgrass Science.
  • Reuben Kudiabor, third-place doctorate poster competition – Agronomic Production Systems-Precision Agriculture.
  • Varnika Kalaichelvan, first-place master’s student poster – Weedy and Invasive Plants.
  • Luke Whitely, second-place five-minute rapid talk with poster – Plant Genetic Resources
  • Varun Kumar Reddy Cheruku, third-place five-minute rapid talk and poster – Plant Genetic Resources.
  • Noriki Miyanaka, first place oral presentation – Model Applications in Field Research; and second place oral presentation — Carbon Farming as a Climate Change Solution.
  • Lithma Kariyawasam Hetti Gamage, second-place poster presentation – Climatology and Modeling.
  • Madan Sapkota, second-place poster and first-place oral presentation – Golf Turf Management and Remote Sensing.
  • Ashton Franks, third-place poster – Turfgrass and Ecology.
  • Chase Martin, first-place oral presentation – Turfgrass Breeding, Genomics, Physiology and Molecular Biology.
  • Dipak Khanal, first-place five-minute rapid talk with poster.
  • Dallas Williams, first-place five-minute rapid talk – Urban and Anthropogenic Soils.
  • Bright Fafali Dogbey, third-place oral presentation – Global Climate Change Community.
  • Christopher Cobos, second-place five-minute oral presentation and poster – Soil and Water Management Conservation.
  • Purushottam Gyawali, first-place poster – Evapotranspiration Measurement and Modeling.
  • Hendra Gonsalve Lasar, second-place oral presentation – Sustainable Intensification.
  • Parjinder Sidhu, first-place oral presentation – Nutrient Management.
  • Jaiveer Brar, first-place oral presentation, second-place doctoral student – Turfgrass Ecology.
  • Pulkit Juneja, second-place oral presentation – Satellite and Remote Sensing.

Two undergraduate students were also recognized with poster and oral presentation awards.

  • Chloe Tilley, plant and environmental soil science senior, third-place oral session.
  • Ayden Castillo, political science senior, first-place poster contest.
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