Staff

Ros manages and produces NIAB’s PR and communications, conveying all aspects of work carried out by NIAB, through various channels including events, web, social media, publications and press, to meet member and stakeholder needs.

Research Interests:

Molecular plant breeding and the study of genetic diversity and domestication of crop plants using molecular markers to identify and quantify genotype changes.

Mark is on the NIAB Executive and is responsible for all facilities across the Group, trials and farm operations at Cambridge and East Malling and health and safety.

Clare has worked in variety evaluation at NIAB for nearly 30 years, mainly with combinable crops and more recently focused on cereals. Much of Clare’s work revolves around knowledge transfer within the industry both through the NIAB membership as well as to a much wider audience. Translating data and trial information into a digestible format for the growers and agronomists to use on the front line is a high priority. She is widely regarded as a key source of  independent variety advice to growers.

Since joining NIAB from the commercial sector in 2007, Phil has worked on key breeding and pre-breeding projects including NIAB's flagship wheat resynthesis programme, the multi-partner WISP, DFW and DSW wheat pre-breeding initiatives, and the development of wheat MAGIC populations.

Phil is now leading and managing NIAB’s portfolio of pre-breeding work across a range of broad-acre arable crops, including cereals, legumes and others. This is often collaborative work with industry partners from breeding companies, end-users and other parts of the supply chain.

Stephen Flack has responsibility for the management of the ACC work on the APHA contract for agricultural DUS and seed certification of agricultural species in England and Wales. Throughout his career, Stephen has worked mainly with crop certification, initially of potatoes and later for all agricultural crop species covered by the UK Seeds regulations, especially with the non-cereal crops.  He has also been responsible for DUS (Distinctness, Uniformity and Stability) testing of sugar beet, field beans and for potato variety trials. 

Research interests

Lesley has lead a research programme investigating the genetics, cellular and molecular biology of partial, adult plant expressed and nonhost resistance to fungal pathogens in wheat since 1995. In 2012 Boyd moved her research programme to NIAB.

Responsibilities

Professor Mario Caccamo was appointed as the Head of Crop Bioinformatics at NIAB in 2015, Managing Director of NIAB EMR in 2017 and NIAB CEO in October 2021.

A computer scientist by training, Mario has over 20 years’ experience in life science research and big data, including specific projects to apply the latest DNA sequencing technologies and bioinformatics methods to advance scientific understanding of crop genetics and the interaction of agricultural crops with their environment.