Stories

Portrait of Abe Koo

April 17, 2025

Abraham (Abe) Koo receives CAFNR’s 2025 Outstanding Mid-Career Research Award as part of Celebration of Excellence

Koo is a leading plant biochemist known for his groundbreaking research on jasmonic acid (JA), a key hormone in plant defense and stress response.

Morgan Davis

April 17, 2025

Morgan Davis receives Outstanding Early Investigator Research Award as part of Celebration of Excellence

At Mizzou since 2020, Davis is a standout early-career researcher with a rapidly growing national reputation. His interdisciplinary work focuses on soil greenhouse gas emissions, soil health, cover crops and sustainable agriculture practices.

Hendrickson smiling.

April 17, 2025

Mary Hendrickson receives the Distinguished Research Award as part of 2025 Celebration of Excellence

Mary Hendrickson, professor in the Division of Applied Social Sciences, has been presented with the CAFNR Distinguished Research Award for her internationally recognized scholarship on food systems. Her research addresses corporate concentration in agriculture, local and alternative food systems and the pursuit of resilient, equitable food networks. A prolific scholar, she has over 70 publications, more than 3,000 citations and has secured over $20 million in research funding as PI or Co-PI. Mary Hendrickson Hendrickson’s interdisciplinary work bridges sociology, economics, ecology and law, with findings cited globally, including in United Nations reports. She has presented across five continents, testified before…

A light-skinned woman with long, dark hair smiles in front of a stone wall. She is wearing a black button-up shirt.

April 17, 2025

Samantha Carter receives the 2025 CAFNR William R. Lamberson Distinguished Dissertation Award as part of Celebration of Excellence

Samantha Carter received the 2025 CAFNR William R. Lamberson Distinguished Dissertation Award for her dissertation, “Natural Resource Justice as an Anticolonial Practice: Policies of Sovereignty.” Carter earned her Ph.D. in Natural Resources in summer 2024 and now serves as a postdoctoral scholar at Northwestern University.  Samantha Carter Her research explores Indigenous rights and natural resource law through an anticolonial lens, blending legal and social science methods. Her dissertation includes three manuscripts: one analyzing mining jurisdiction post-McGirt v. Oklahoma (Montana Law Review), another examining cannabis regulation in Indian Country (Mercer Law Review) and a third comparing Indigenous resource governance in New…

Six women pose for a photos with a plaque.

April 14, 2025

Mizzou National Agri-Marketing Association (NAMA) wins 1st place at national competition

The Mizzou NAMA team received first place in the student marketing competition at the 2024 Agri-Marketing Conference held in Kansas City, April 9-11.

fountains at a park

April 10, 2025

A walk in the park? Research takes a deeper look at urban green spaces

Nilon’s work focuses on understanding how plants and animals use urban spaces and how people connect with those ecosystems.

Jeri Lou and daughter on a trip

April 9, 2025

Get to know Jeri Lou Zimmerman

Jeri Lou Zimmerman What are your job duties/job responsibilities in the College of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources? I am the Director of CAFNR Grants. Our office handles the pre-award side of sponsored grants and contracts for all of CAFNR and the College of Business through a MOU which is mostly done by the Grant Writers in our office. I do help out with proposals as needed which it has been recently as we have an open position. My proposal specialties are USDA, commodity groups, and foundations. I leave the big NIH, NSF, DOE, and DOD for Angie Hake and…

Two women holding plants.

April 9, 2025

Catch Up with CAFNR – April 2025

Catch Up with CAFNR, February 2025: A photo gallery of CAFNR happenings!

Allen and Melissa Niedermann, holding a photo of themselves from 2001, during their time at Mizzou.

April 3, 2025

Love in the Lab

Allen and Melissa Niedermann met in an entomology lab in 1998 and now two of their children attend Mizzou as legacies, one of whom inherited their love of entomology.

April 3, 2025

FAPRI releases baseline food and agricultural outlook report

The financial outlook for U.S. farmers in 2025 is like a painting with two contrasting scenes. Crop producers, in muted tones, face declining crop prices despite modest reductions in input costs, while cattle producers are colored in vibrant tones amid record prices. Above both, an unpredictable sky looms, symbolizing uncertainty in trade policy and programs that further complicate the economic landscape for agricultural producers. To help stakeholders navigate this complex scenery, the Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute at the University of Missouri (FAPRI) recently released its annual agricultural market baseline outlook, providing 10-year projections for agricultural and biofuels markets.