USDA-ARS Switchgrass II Conference 2013

The U.S. Dairy For­age Research Cen­ter (USD­FRC) is kindly invit­ing you to par­tic­i­pate in the Switch­grass II Con­fer­ence 2013, held Sep­tem­ber 10 – 12, 2013 in Madi­son, Wis­con­sin, United States.

The con­fer­ence will bring together sci­en­tists and stu­dents inter­ested in switch­grass and other prairie grasses to dis­cuss the state of the art of prairie grass research. It will be an excel­lent oppor­tu­nity to meet and inter­act with researchers from a wide range of dis­ci­plines, including:

• agron­omy
• phys­i­ol­ogy
• ecol­ogy
• soil sci­ence
• pathol­ogy
• ento­mol­ogy
• genet­ics
• genomics
• mol­e­c­u­lar biology.

The con­fer­ence will include a field tour, sev­eral ple­nary pre­sen­ta­tions, selected vol­un­teered oral pre­sen­ta­tions, a poster ses­sion, and one or more workshops.

Who should attend?

Fac­ulty, sci­en­tists, post-​doctoral fel­lows, and stu­dents with a research inter­est in switch­grass and other grass species of tall­grass prairie and savanna habitat.

Con­firmed Speakers

• Ken­neth Vogel
• Kelly Craven
• Tiffany Heng-​Moss
• Kevin Shin­ners
• Michael Casler
• Jeremy Schmutz
• Nathan Springer
• Philip Robert­son

Pre­lim­i­nary Schedule

Sep­tem­ber 10

The con­fer­ence will open Tues­day morn­ing with a field tour. We’ll visit two nearby sites: a highly diverse local prairie/​savanna site that illus­trates the range in diver­sity of prairie plants across soil types and Arling­ton Agri­cul­tural Research Sta­tion, home of inten­sive research cov­er­ing agron­omy, phys­i­ol­ogy, ecol­ogy, breed­ing, genet­ics, and genomics of switch­grass, big bluestem, and indian grass.

After the field tour, there will be time to relax on the Uni­ver­sity of Wisconsin-​Madison Memo­r­ial Union Ter­race and explore down­town Madison.

Sep­tem­ber 11

Wednes­day will be devoted to oral pre­sen­ta­tions, an all-​day poster ses­sion, and an evening dis­cus­sion of com­mu­nity issues. Reg­is­tra­tion for the con­fer­ence includes lunch and din­ner at the Monona Ter­race on Wednesday.

Sep­tem­ber 12

Thurs­day will also be devoted to oral pre­sen­ta­tions and an all-​day poster ses­sion. Reg­is­tra­tion for the con­fer­ence includes lunch on Thursday.