Staff

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. 

Responsibilities

Promotion and development of sustainable Integrated Weed Management.

Leading and manage NIAB’s portfolio of weed management work around effective and efficient use of herbicides. Promoting and developing cultural and non-chemical approaches to reduce our reliance on herbicide solutions.
Working on herbicide resistance assessment and risk analysis to monitor continuing development of herbicide resistance traits as well as risk assessment and baseline development for novel herbicide resistance traits in the UK.

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.

Responsibilities

Helen is responsible for managing and delivering NIAB’s laboratory services work, including the work of the OSTS.