Awarded USDA grant for Marker Assisted Selection! Southern SARE FS24-364 January 28 2025

We were awarded another USDA SARE grant! The project is "Helping Florida Queen Producers to Select for Mite-resistant Stock by Using Marker Assisted Selection" (FS24-364).

This grant funds research for my MS Entomology thesis that I am currently earning at the University of Florida.  Dr. Brock Harpur from Purdue will be my mentor for evaluating DNA samples from 500 colonies.  Then, I will artificially inseminate queens with drones from the best colonies, these breeder queens are given to queen producers.  These AI breeder queens will be used produce superior mite-resistant queens for their customers across the nation.