Our researchers

Milton Boyd

Milton's research covers a number of areas such as quantitative finance, risk management, derivatives (futures and options), portfolio management, financial markets, international business, and business strategy. His research also covers various types of insurance projects, including crop insurance, livestock insurance, weather insurance, optimal reinsurance modelling, and insurance premium computation.

Derek Brewin

Agricultural marketing, especially spatial grain, livestock and oilseed markets as well as the economics of innovation in food processing and plant breeding.

Ryan Cardwell

Ryan's research interests include the economics of food policy, international trade regulation, and foreign aid, with a focus on international food aid. Current research topics include understanding the determinants of support for economic policies, the effects of tariff barriers on international food assistance, and the effects of regulation on productivity.

Jared Carlberg

Jared's research focuses upon agricultural economics, specifically in the area of agricultural marketing.

Julieta Frank

Julieta's research is in the areas of commodity futures markets, market efficiency, risk management, market microstructure and time series analysis. Current research projects focus on the estimation of the cost of liquidity in electronic markets, hedging in the presence of both price and currency risk, and alternative marketing strategies for wheat in Canada.

Tengda Gong

Tengda's research spans in the field of agricultural economics, development economics and empirical IO as well as environmental economics. His recent research focuses on understanding how public policies and market mechanisms affect the functioning of agrifood systems amid market imperfections and climate change, with a focus on welfare implications.

Alankrita Goswami

Research interests include agricultural commodity markets, price analysis, and risk-management.

Charles Grant

Bisecting Pearson's Kurtosis
Factors affecting the use of futures hedging by commodity producing firms: a multi-factor model approach

Chad Lawley

Primary research fields in environmental, resource, and agricultural economics. Recent research has focused on the economics of habitat conservation, land tenure, environmental regulation, and agricultural policy.

Brian Oleson

Brian's research interests focus on commodity pricing and risk management from a producer perspective, agricultural outlook, trade and co-operatives. His background includes senior management in grain marketing including extensive trade negotiation experience.

Mostafa Shartaj

Mostafa is focussed on research surrounding agricultural and environmental policy, resource use, conservation practice and technology adoption, farmers' risk and time preferences, dynamic decision making, economic valuation, and wildlife management.

Gabriel Dallago

Gabriel's research focuses on optimizing decision-making processes regarding farm management practices by leveraging the flexibility of machine learning and deep learning algorithms. The ultimate goal is to improve both animal welfare and the sustainability of livestock production systems.

Hooman Derakhshani

Hooman's lab research focuses on understanding mechanisms by which microbiome contribute to host physiology and health. The lab uses a variety of molecular and omics techniques, including highthroughput culturomics and metagenomics to reveal therapeutic potentials of the livestock microbiomes to improve animal welfare, disease resilience and production performance.

Marcos Cunha-Cordeiro

Marcos' research focuses on assessing agronomic and environmental dynamics in agro-ecosystems using field monitoring and modelling tools. He uses a diverse set of agricultural and hydrological models [HYDRUS-1D, DRAINMOD-N, IFSM, Cold Regions Hydrological Model (CRHM), SWAT model, and custom models programmed using the R language] applied at point, field, farm, watershed, provincial, and national scales to investigate current and emerging issues in crop and animal production systems. Spatial analysis and development of datasets for agro-hydrological modelling are also part of his expertise.

Meagan King

Meagan is an Assistant Professor in Animal Physiology and Welfare in the Department of Animal Science. Her research looks at animal health, behaviour, and welfare with the goal of improving the lives of people and animals.

Emma McGeough

Emma's research interests include forage evaluation for beef and dairy production systems, mitigation of enteric methane emissions from ruminant livestock, life-cycle assessment and carbon footprinting of livestock commodities. Current areas of research include environmental footprinting of the Canadian beef industry, forage evaluation for improved resilience of cow-calf production systems, lipid supplementation for enteric methane abatement.

Martin Nyachoti

Martin's area of expertise is animal nutrition with a focus on monogastric nutrition. The research seeks to understand interactions between nutrition and gut health and function in the non-ruminant, energy and nutrient (mainly nitrogen and phosphorus) utilization to mitigate feed cost and environmental impact, and feed ingredient evaluation.

Karmin O

Karmin's current research focus includes (i) studies on the regulation of oxidative stress, inflammation and lipid metabolism in human and animal health and disease (ie. fatty liver disease, acute kidney injury, dyslipidemia, diabetes and metabolic disorders); (ii) mechanistic studies of natural products, supplements and feed in cell and animal models; and (iii) clinical and epidemiological studies in healthy and high risk populations to identify risk factors for obesity, cardiovascular disease, gestational diabetes and its impact on mother-infant health.

Kim Ominski

High tannin forages can improve sustainability of cattle production systems
Use of tannin-containing legumes in beef cattle production systems
Examination of the multi-functionality of forages in Manitoba
Developing a strategy for forage and grassland management in Manitoba through an examination of the multi-functionality of forages, including net greenhouse gas emissions and nutrient utilization in forage-based beef cattle production systems

J.C. (Kees) Plaizier

Kees' research focuses on reducing metabolic diseases and enhancing nutrient utilization of dairy cows, as well as the evaluation of novel feeds for cattle and precision farming. This includes evaluating the quality and safety of feeding hemp products to dairy cows.

Argenis Rodas-González

Evaluation of meat composition and quality of domesticated (beef and pork) and exotic species (water buffalo and bison) as well as an investigation into the factors that determine meat shelf life and palatability and application of novel technologies in order to improve them.

Anna Rogiewicz

Anna's research focuses on nutritional biochemistry, with particular interest and expertise on carbohydrates and feed enzyme technology. She is conducting research on the evaluation of the chemical and nutritive characteristics of various feed ingredients, effects of exogenous enzyme supplementation, poultry nutrition, and how various feed components and their derivatives influence the gut microflora, gut health, physiology and ultimately production traits of monogastric animals.

Bogdan Slominski - Professor Emeritus

Chengbo Yang

Chengbo's research team mainly focuses on livestock nutrition/nutritional biochemistry related to non-ruminants. Research interests include 1) investigating molecular and cellular mechanisms of gut chemosensing in gut growth and health, 2) investigating roles of dietary components (feed ingredients and bioactive compounds) on modulation of molecular interactions between pathogens and host, 3) identification of antibiotic alternatives in poultry and swine, 4) Biotechnological and nutritional strategies to improve nutrient utilization efficiency for sustainable animal production.

Warren Blunt

Dr. Blunt's research utilizes the biochemical pathways of microorganisms to convert low-value agro-industrial waste materials (carbon dioxide in particular) into value-added bio-based specialty chemicals. The crux of this research applies advanced monitoring tools to elucidate the interface between process engineering parameters and metabolic control, and the impact on process performance.

Ying Chen

Ying has research interests in agricultural machinery, soil dynamics, conservation tillage, and seeding. Ying carries out intensive simulations of soil-machine interactions using the discrete element method (DEM). Examples of machinery include tillage implements and seeders, and off-road vehicles. Ying also works on processing/decortication of fibre crops (hemp, flax, and canola).

Nazim Cicek

Biofuels and Bio-products generation, Wastewater treatment, Anaerobic digestion, Microbial population dynamics, Antibiotic resistance, Biogas and Bioenergy, Bio-polymer and Bio-plastics Production, Fermentation Engineering, Biological Nutrient Removal and Recovery, Bioreactor design and operation, Engineered Wetland Treatment

Chyngyz Erkinbaev

Chyngyz's research focuses on smart sensing technologies for monitoring food quality and safety with an emphasis on the development of computational tools. His current research includes the development of a multimodal approach for non-destructive and accurate quality assessment of various food matrices during the processing.

Fuji Jian

Fuji's research expertise is in the mathematical modelling of stored grain ecosystem. His most recent research focuses on insect detection, insect ecology and population dynamics, grain drying and aeration, airflow resistance due to segregation of dockage and foreign materials, grain processing, and mathematical modelling of the above-mentioned research topics.

David Levin

David's research integrates microbiology, molecular biology, and genome sciences, with bioprocess engineering to understand the relationships between genome content, gene and gene product expression, metabolic pathway utilization, and end-product synthesis so that we may develop strategies to increase the efficiencies and yields of products synthesize by microorganisms.

Song Liu

Song's expertise lies in polymer/organic chemistry, biomaterials, nanotechnology and microbiology. His research program exists at the exciting convergence of material chemistry and microbiology. The research program applies chemistry/polymer science/nanotechnology in novel ways to meet biological challenges such as infection control, responsive and targeted drug delivery, and biomaterial biocompatibility.

Danny Mann

Danny's research bridges the disciplines of agricultural/biosystems engineering and ergonomics. The over-arching objective, that guides his research program, is to generate knowledge that improves our understanding of the human-machine interactions associated with the use of agricultural machines. Currently, his effort is directed to understanding how to incorporate real-time sensory information into an automation interface to enable remote supervision of autonomous agricultural machines.

Mashiur Rahman

Over the past 10 years, Mashiur has patented a new fibre from waste biomass of canola plant (canola fibre) and established the properties of both canola and cattail fibres for automobile and aviation industries. The long-term research is to develop multiple harvest times for waste biomass fibres that will be suitable for specific applications using artificial intelligence software. His research also covers textile dyeing formulations in providing camouflage in the infrared regions for the military uniforms to blend into the soldier's background.

Ranjan Sri Ranjan

Field research on irrigation of drainage impact on the yield of field crops. Water quality and quantity impact of on-farm water management. Development of instrumentation for soil and water engineering. Design and evaluation of aeroponic and capillary irrigation systems. Remediation of contaminated soils. EM methods for salinity assessment. Measuring the impact of snow-melt infiltration under different cropping systems and landscapes.

Qiang Zhang

Precision livestock farming, air quality in animal production facilities, airborne transmission of animal diseases, dispersion of environmental odour, energy efficient greenhouses, sustainable food production in northern climate conditions, grain storage ecosystem, and mechanical behaviour of bulk solids.

Wen Zhong

Application of nanotechnology in biomaterials, including 1) multifunctional nanofibers for wound care and tissue engineering; 2) environmental responsive nano-carriers for therapeutic agents (e.g. anticancer drugs, antibacterial agents); 3) composite hydrogels for sensors in biomedicine and smart farming.

Kyle Bobiwash

Kyle's research aims to address questions associated with beneficial insect ecology and insect conservation in agroecosystems and natural landscapes. Specifically, his research looks to better understand habitat as a resource landscape that drives community composition and the health of species found therein. Through studying insect behaviour, diversity and responses to changes in climate or habitat he hopes to strengthen our capacity to conserve biodiversity and manage land to ensure the integrity of its ecological functioning.

Alejandro Costamagna

Study of insect ecology in agricultural landscapes with the goal to contribute to the sustainable management of pests. Specifically, his lab focuses on ecosystem services, biodiversity, and landscape complexity; insect dispersal; predator-prey interactions; functional traits; trophic and guild interactions; bottom-up and top-down regulation; trophic cascades; biological control; host plant resistance.

Robert Currie – Professor Emeritus

Rob's research focus is on understanding and managing the health of honey bees and native pollinators in order to improve honey production and the vital pollination services provided by them.

Terry Galloway – Professor Emeritus

Terry's research focuses on population ecology of ectoparasites of domestic animals and wildlife

Jason Gibbs

Wild bee diversity and systematics. Research includes alpha taxonomy, molecular systematics, phylogenomics, behaviour, ecology, and pollination of wild bees. Focus is to improve understanding of wild bees for conservation and agriculture. Curator of the J.B. Wallis / R.E. Roughley Museum of Entomology.

Yang Liu

Specializaton in taxonomy, pest control and the structure of insect movement.

Nuria Morfin

Honeybee biology and apiculture: Effects of stressors on honey bee health and behaviour; behavioural immunity; selective breeding; honey bee pathology; and sustainable practices for managed pollinators.

Kateryn Rochon

Specialization in veterinary entomology, including ecology, surveillance, and management of arthropod pests associated with livestock and wildlife.

Michel Aliani

Development of flavourful functional foods, and investigation of their effects on different biochemical pathways using mass spectrometry (MS) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR)-based flavouromics and metabolomics tools.

Rotimi Aluko

Rotimi's work focuses on the production of bioactive peptides through enzymatic hydrolysis of food proteins and isolation of functional proteins. Of special interest are the antihypertensive, antioxidant, anticholinesterase and antiproliferative peptides as well as proteins that could serve as ingredients in food formulation. In addition to optimized enzymatic release of peptides and development of novel protein extraction methods, his research program also investigates their structure-function properties using in vitro, in vivo and chemometric approaches.

Harold Aukema

Harold's research focuses on oxylipins, which are bioactive lipid mediators made from fats. Oxylipins are important in nutrition because dietary composition impacts health through the formation of these oxylipins. The Nutrition and Lipid Mediators laboratory is located in the St. Boniface Hospital Albrechtsen Research Centre.

Trust Beta

Trust's research addresses critical questions relating to the extent to which phytochemicals in grains and other plant-derived functional foods can confer health benefits. Her world class calibre research has offered a progressively more detailed investigation of the fundamental biochemistry of phytochemicals particularly phenolic and carotenoid constituents, including their structural identification and antioxidant actions at cellular level as well as an understanding of their biological activity and therefore, their physiological impact on tissues and animals.

Peter Eck

Peter's program aims to determine the impacts of genetic variations on health outcomes which are modifiable by dietary intervention. To achieve this he investigates the biological impact of disease-associated genetic variations using molecular biology, cell biology and model organisms. Through collaborations he also participates in human studies.

Michael Eskin

Optimizing the extraction of phenolic compounds from canola and mustard with a particular interest in the production of canolol and related phenolic derivatives their antioxidant and anticancer properties. Also collaborating on nutritional strategies to ameliorate the devastating effects of alcohol on the fetus causing Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder.

Filiz Koksel

Filiz's research program focuses on novel and traditional food processes to create safe, nutritious and palatable plant-based foods. Her research interests include electromagnetic and mechanical waves as tools to investigate food quality. She is also interested in how different grain components influence mechanical and functional properties of protein-rich foods.

Christina Lengyel

Dylan MacKay

Dylan is a clinical trialist specializing in human nutrition. His current research program is focused on nutrition interventions for obesity, type 2 diabetes, and chronic kidney disease. He has expertise in the appropriate design and implementation of clinical trials, especially involving nutrition interventions that are delivered within, or in parallel to, the healthcare system. Dylan is also very interested in how to combat misinformation related to nutrition and health, especially on the internet and social media.

Maneka Malalgoda

Maneka's research focuses on grain chemistry and processing quality and how grain-based ingredients can be used to produce healthy, nutritious and high quality food. Her research program specifically investigates the physicochemical properties of grain proteins and starch, their functionality and processing quality, and the biological activity of grain biomacromolecules.

Mohammed Moghadasian

Mohammed's research interests are in the area of functional foods and nutraceuticals in the prevention of chronic diseases, particularly coronary artery disease and diabetes with a specific focus on lipids and lipoprotein metabolism; inflammation and inflammatory markers; oxidative stress and antioxidants; and gut microbiome.

Semone Myrie

Nutrition and inherited metabolic diseases, and sports nutrition.

Leslie Redmond

Leslie's research interests include improving the food, nutrition, and physical activity environments in combination with behavioural economics in theory-based, culturally appropriate, and community-centered interventions for the prevention of obesity and other diet-related chronic diseases in minoritized populations. Other interests include investigating sustainable solutions to food insecurity among college students.

Claudia Narvaez

Claudia's research focuses on food microbiology, specifically risk assessment associated with plant and animal food-based products, mitigation strategies to decrease foodborne pathogens in the food continuum. Her current research is targeting foodborne pathogens persistence mechanisms in food processing environments, antimicrobial resistance and natural interventions to reduce foodborne pathogens.

Natalie Riediger

Research focus and expertise: food security, Indigenous health, nutritional epidemiology, community-based research, mixed methods, Statistics Canada survey data analysis, food inequities, sugar-sweetened beverages.

Cristina Rosell

Cristina's research aims at the inclusion of cereals and grains in the human diet through developing innovative and sensory accepted cereal-based products based on rational modulation of their biochemical and rheological properties. A holistic approach is applied in all the research projects including biochemistry, rheology, quality and nutritional attributes to enhance the marketability and healthfulness of cereals and grains commodities and the resulting foods. to meet consumer and producer demands. are main areas of research.

Martin Scanlon

Grains are the cornerstone of our global food system. Understanding how grains are transformed into delicious nutritious foods is not only a vital scientific undertaking, it triggers broad interdisciplinary questions: do fractures propagate in aerated foods such as bread or beer?

Miyoung Suh

Miyoung's research focuses on two major areas: i) studying the critical role of dietary lipids and nutrients in male reproductive systems in obese, diabetic and other metabolically challenged animal models; ii) studying the role of dietary lipids in retinal function focusing on retinal diseases such as diabetic retinopathy, macular degeneration and retinitis pigmentosa. Her lab approaches these research questions through preclinical (rats and mice) and clinical trials with interventions of lipids, antioxidants and alcohol.

Carla Taylor

Carla's research investigates how dietary compounds, such as lipids and bioactive compounds found in pulses, oilseeds and buckwheat, may be beneficial for prevention and management of obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Her research employs preclinical models to elucidate mechanisms of action, and clinical studies to apply the findings to humans.

Belay Ayele

Belay's research investigates plant hormones in cereal crops with respect to their roles in regulating crop productivity and response to the changing environment. His research specifically identifies novel genes that underlie hormone levels and responses, and elucidates their functions in controlling important agronomic traits and tolerance to abiotic stress factors.

Dilshan Benaragama

Weed biology and ecology, integrated weed management, cropping systems and weed adaptations, remote sensing applications in weed research.

Douglas Cattani

Primary areas of interest are in perennial crop breeding and agronomy, (intermediate wheatgrass and perennial sunflower). Emphasis is crop adaptation to new environments, response to agronomic interventions on phenological development. Other interests; herbaceous perennials for forage and bioenergy; crop development for expansion into boreal and northern areas of Canada.

Harmeet Chawla

Harmeet's research program aims to leverage genomic, bioinformatics and genetic engineering to design climate change resilient crops for Canada. One of the main foci of his research is to integrate latest genomic technologies and advanced bioinformatics to further accelerate the progress of high erucic acid rapeseed breeding program at the University of Manitoba. He is also interested in genome assembly and annotation of other agriculturally important plant species such as bread wheat, barley, oats and durum wheat.

Fouad Daayf

Research focus on molecular and biochemical mechanisms of plant-pathogen interactions (plant defence, pathogen counter-defence, signalling). Applied research cover diagnosis and biological control of diseases in corn, soybean, potato, wheat, and oat (previously also sunflower, canola, carrot, date palm, olive, cucumber, Saskatoons, and tomato), with collaboration within Canada and abroad.

Loveleen Dhillon - Agronomist in Residence

Research is focused on developing optimal agronomic management practices for corn, flax, and sunflower production in Manitoba. Working closely with producers to refine weed management strategies, boost crop productivity, and enhance the overall profitability, ensuring long-term viability of special crop production in Manitoba's diverse farming systems.

Robert Duncan

Rob's research focuses genetics and breeding canola and rapeseed for improved quality and performance across western Canada. Traits of interest include protein quality and content, oil content, fatty acid composition, abiotic and biotic stress tolerance.

Martin Entz

Martin founded the Glenlea long-term organic rotation study, Canada's oldest organic versus conventional comparison study. Martin has also conducted research on integrated systems such as no-till and crop-livestock integration. His dedication to improving organic agricultural systems has yielded innovations in agronomic management and plant genetics, for example, the development of a mulch-based system that allows no-till to be practiced in organic farming in certain years. Martin and his students have conducted some of their work in southern and eastern Africa and in Asia. The focus of this work involves integration of legume plants into conservation agriculture systems.

Dilantha Fernando

Dilantha's research focuses on sustainable disease management methods and IPM, and involves investigating the intrinsic interactions between host and pathogen in canola, wheat and barley. His lab specializes in plant disease epidemiology, pre-breeding, R-gene-Avr-gene interactions, using cutting-edge tools as RNAi, CRISPR, transcriptomics, genomics and proteomics. Dilantha studies how new pathogens enter new areas and countries using genetic diversity and other techniques. His lab collaborates on research related to the microbiome, plant growth promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR) and biological control.

Robert Gulden

Weed and crop ecology and management, integrated weed management, herbicide resistance, crop and weed modelling, biostatistics.

Kristen MacMillan - Agronomist in Residence

Applied soybean and pulse crop agronomy and cropping systems research. Research mission is to develop best management practices that optimize agronomy, profitability and sustainability for farmers and increase their adoption through applied agronomic research, extension and training and integration of those processes.

Curt McCartney

Focused on breeding hard red winter wheat varieties for western Canada and the genetics of resistance to Fusarium head blight (FHB), rust diseases, and orange wheat blossom midge. He is interested in the development and implementation of DNA markers in wheat breeding through marker-assisted and genomic selection.

Claudio Stasolla

Claudio's research focuses on understanding the physiological and molecular mechanisms adopted by plants to cope with diverse conditions of abiotic stress with emphasis on excess moisture and water stress.

Inoka Amarakoon

Inoka's research program focuses on characterizing the fate of contaminants of agricultural origin (including pharmaceuticals, hormones, pesticides, and excess nutrients) in the agroecosystem for the sustainability of agriculture, the health of the environment, and the public's health and well-being.

Nasem Badreldin

Nasem's research focuses on modelling the cumulative spatiotemporal impacts of different agricultural management practices and climate change on various crops, soil health, and landscape development using various big remote sensing data and advanced analytics to support agriculture and environmental sustainability.

Alistair Brown

Alistair's program is dedicated to mass spectrometric method validation across many disciplines: including environment, nutrition, and engineering. I am particularly interested in novel analytical instrumental methods to analyze organic contaminants in soil, surface waters, sediments, and engineered waters. The research is very interdisciplinary with equal time split between the outdoors and the lab.

Henrique Da Ros Carvalho

Henrique's research explores the cycling of energy and mass in agricultural systems using micrometeorological techniques. He seeks to better understand the mechanisms controlling the exchanges of energy and mass between the land surface and the atmosphere, to determine which agricultural practices are most efficient in utilizing natural resources to produce food and energy without negative impacts on soil and water resources.

Annemieke Farenhorst

Annemieke is the Associate Vice-President Research at the University of Manitoba. Her research focuses on the environmental fate of pesticides and antimicrobials and on contaminants in drinking water. She is also engaged in projects that empower women as farmers, and as professionals in natural sciences and engineering careers.

Don Flaten – Professor Emeritus

Don maintains an interest in the effects of agricultural management practices on N, P, K, S and micronutrients from soil reserves, various forms and types of fertilizers, livestock manures, industrial byproducts and municipal waste and their impact on crop yield, crop quality, agricultural sustainability, and environmental quality.​

Xiaopeng Gao

Xiaopeng's research focus is on the development and application of best management practices to improve soil fertility and nutrient management in agroecosystems. His current work involves 1) assessment of the agronomic and environmental effects of nutrient management; 2) GHG emissions from agricultural/grassland ecosystems; and 3) nutrient availability in rhizosphere.

Hailong He

Hailong's research interests are to better understand, measure and model mass and energy (with a focus on soil water, heat, solutes, and GHG) transport processes in the critical zone of arid and cold regions under climate change, with innovative and multidisciplinary methods and technologies.

David Lobb

David is a Professor of Landscape Ecology. His research and training span soil and water management and conservation, from the field scale to the watershed scale. David has established himself as an international expert in soil erosion processes and their impacts on biophysical processes within landscapes.

Afua Mante

Afua's research program focuses on characterizing and optimizing soil physical properties and processes and their interaction with soil water and nutrient management strategies and field operations for sustainable management of agroecosystems in cold climate region.

Joanne Thiessen Martens

Joanne's research program focuses on nutrient flows in agroecosystems, especially phosphorus dynamics in soil-plant systems. Her research interests also include soil fertility management in alternative agricultural production systems, such as organic production, integrated crop-livestock systems, and diversified cropping systems, as well as the use of recycled fertilizers.

Mario Tenuta

Mario's research addresses many soil related issues, including improving nitrogen use efficiency of crops, mitigating greenhouse gas emissions, developing rapid molecular tests and field surveys of emerging soil borne diseases and nematode pests of crops, and comparing sustainability of production systems on the Canadian Prairies.

Francis Zvomuya

Francis' research interests include remediation of contaminated sites, reclamation of disturbed sites, drilling waste management, non-traditional fertilizers and organic amendments, contaminant dynamics in soils, and soil health. Current and recent projects include phytoremediation of end-of-life municipal lagoons; antimicrobial fate in soils; struvite utilization; pipeline and well-site reclamation, and statistical modelling.