My hometown of Riverside is in Southern California where I was born and raised. I even got both my degrees from UC Riverside! I have worked in California, Germany, Belgium, North Carolina and now I love working at Penn State! I dote on my two cats, enjoy time outdoors, and bring food experiments into my kitchen. While I have taught at many universities throughout my career, my allegiance lies with my paycheck – We Are Penn State!

As a plant stem cell biologist, I have always found the process of differentiation to be critical to organismal development- be it plants or people! I see the role of an educator as that of a groundskeeper of a garden. If I observe my students struggling, I foster an environment that encourages growth and resiliency, rather than deem them unworthy of my garden (AKA gatekeeping). I am driven to make biology accessible to any student and cultivate an appreciation for team work as a requirement for scientific problem solving. Our learning communities are enriched through diversity, and that without a diversity of scientists we carry out inferior science. I strive to provide students with clear expectations, structure, and use evidence-based methods of scientific teaching shown to improve any student’s learning capacity. My goal as an educator is to promote and model inclusivity and equity as I train scientists, as my ultimate goal is to recruit & promote diversity in the STEM workforce. What are your career goals? I’d love to help you reach them!

Dr. Sjogren’s Core Scientific Value: Whoever you are, wherever you come from, whatever your background, science is strengthened through diversity by bringing together groups of dedicated individuals to solve problems together. In our differences, lay the solutions to some of life’s greatest challenges!

My name is Dr. Malcolm. I am a teacher in the Penn State Biology department, who also enjoys writing and research. I have a background in microbial-plant ecology, but have researched and taught in systems ranging from molecular to ecosystem scales, in contexts including global climate change and sustainable agriculture. I started conducting research as a Biology undergraduate student at a small school, Union College, in upstate New York. I was fortunate to present that work at a national undergraduate research conference (NCUR) and even publish my research early on during my PhD. I pursued a PhD in Ecology at Penn State and I have mentored many Penn State undergraduate student researchers over 13 years as a graduate student and then post-doctoral researcher/research associate. I continue to mentor students in the FRI lab, which I look forward to every fall semester. As an Ecologist, it probably won’t surprise you that I love hiking and the outdoors. I also love reading and writing poetry and fiction.

Any student has the potential to be successful as a researcher. Having run into challenges myself, including lack of knowledge about college and research as a first generation student, as a woman in science, as a great English writer but initially poor technical science writer, I find I think a lot about how to start small and build skills toward research. I always take a pulse on where each student is at and think collaboratively with them how to help them move from where they are at to where they would like to be as a researcher. I also love to give students opportunity to take the lead, with them knowing that no failure is failure, but instead a great learning experience. Or as we say in FRI lab, “Let’s troubleshoot!”. I look forward to working with you!

Hi FRIoneers, I’m Dr. Anderson. I grew up in Lancaster, PA and completed my undergrad degree at UNC Chapel Hill (go Heels!), my PhD at Stanford, and my postdoc at UC Berkeley before joining the faculty here at Penn State. My research focuses on the dynamics of plant cell walls: how they are built, modified, and degraded, and how understanding these dynamics can help us sustainably produce food, bioenergy, and biomaterials from plants. Outside of lab I enjoy running, triathlons, disc golf, and doing anything outdoors with my family.

I think everyone is a scientist and had the potential to do great science; they just might not know it yet. My approach to mentoring is flexible: as a mentor, I range between hands-on and hands-off, depending on the needs of each mentee. I love helping students develop their own ideas and figure things out, because scientific discoveries are so exciting and satisfying when you take them from an initial glimmer to fully analyzed data and new insights into the wonders of the natural world!

I grew up in a very small town in upstate New York (Franklin), attended college at Ithaca College, and then earned a Ph.D. in Plant Biology from the University of California at Berkeley. I then spent three years performing research as a post-doctoral fellow at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research at MIT before joining the Biology faculty at Penn State. At Penn State most of my time is devoted to research on plant genetics. I am focused on understanding natural genetic mechanisms in plants and on applying that understanding to improve agricultural productivity. In my free time I enjoy running, golf, hiking, cooking, winter sports, and spending time with my wife and two children.

I set consistent high standards for all of my students and then give them the tools to reach those standards. I model hard work, positive attitude, and most importantly a never-give-up spirit. My ultimate goal is to show my students the awesome power of the scientific approach to understanding the biological world and to improve the human condition.

I came to the US when I was a second-year undergraduate student and went to Temple to continue my studies as a Biology and Biochemistry double major. I then became a Ph.D. student at MIT and completed dissertation research on yeast gene regulation using genetic and molecular methods. After post-doctoral training at Caltech on plant development and leading a research group at Cold Spring Harbor Lab, I came to Penn State in 1998 as an associate professor. I am passionate about teaching undergraduate students on knowledge and research approaches and about conducting research on plant development and evolution together with undergraduate students, graduate students and post-doctoral scientists.

I enjoy work with young people with a variety of interests and I like to help them prepare for their future careers. I feel strongly that scientific research is an excellent way to learn how to observe in detail for an area of investigation, how to formulate questions, how to design a set of studies and examinations, and how to  analyze the obtained data to arrive at sound conclusions. These processes are crucial for sciences, but also can be used effectively in many other human endeavors. My specific areas of research are plant developmental biology and evolution. Plant development is crucial for both the health of ecosystems and productive agriculture and our findings can contribute to these areas. Evolutionary knowledge is important for understanding nature and for extending the results from studies of a small number of plants to many other related plants, including crops and wild species. I think everyone can learn through doing research and can become familiar with the scientific process. I hope I can work with FRI students closely to help them grow in the thinking about and doing research. I also look forward to learning together with the students.