Hub Staff
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Kassa Semagn, PhD
 Scientist Unit: International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) Email: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it Kassa Semagn is a Maize Molecular Breeder at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), based at the Biosciences eastern and central Africa/International Livestock Research Institute (BecA-ILRI) Hub, Kenya. He has a wide range of experience in the application of molecular markers in genetic resources characterization, linkage mapping, QTL mapping and molecular breeding in hexaploid wheat, rice, sorghum, pearl millet, barley and maize. In maize, his current main research responsibilities include marker-assisted breeding for drought tolerance, genetic dissection of QTLs for abiotic and biotic stresses, and genetic resources characterization of tropical germplasm. As drought is one of the major constraints for maize production by resourcepoor farmers in Africa, Kassa is involved on CIMMYT’s molecular breeding component of the drought tolerant maize for Africa (DTMA) and water efficient maize for Africa (WEMA) projects. He is also responsible for coordinating large-scale fingerprinting of over 1000 tropical maize inbred lines, advanced breeding lines and open pollinated varieties using SSR and SNP markers. Kassa is interested to continue working in applying molecular tools in developing improved maize varieties for a wide range of traits of interest in Africa, marker identification, targeted fine mapping and validation for major QTLs both for abiotic (e.g., drought, low nitrogen tolerance) and biotic (pests and disease) stresses, and allele mining/gene discovery. |
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