Judith K. Brown

Wonder Makes Me Take Action

Judith Brown works in the complex framework at the intersection of biology and society, focusing on viruses and bacteria transmitted by insect vectors to agriculturally important plants –especially the geminiviruses and the whiteflies that transmit them. She was the first to use a "gene gun" to inoculate genomes of these viruses, the first to estimate the size of the whitefly genome, and among the first to sequence the genome of the sweet potato whitefly.

She also was the first to study whitefly-transmitted plant diseases in Arizona and has become the world's primary expert on emerging plant viruses that infect cotton, recently discovering in the southeastern U.S. cotton-growing region two viruses that are endemic to Africa and Asia. As a response, she is using gene silencing to develop cotton plants endowed with geminivirus/whitefly resistance.

In collaboration with the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Research Service in Miami and Mars Inc., Brown's research group in 2018 started developing molecular tools that growers could use to spot infected cacao trees in Africa before they show symptoms.

Every year, the Plant Virus Diagnostic Laboratory she established in 1990 receives and identifies approximately 10,000 samples of pathogens from all over the world. The Arizona and California departments of agriculture rely on her group to support quarantine efforts to limit the spread of diseases. As coordinator for the National Plant Diagnostic Network, she works with state and national agencies to protect the agriculture sector.

Brown has been recognized with numerous international and national awards. She is a fellow in the American Phytopathological Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She also was given the Frederick L. Wellman Award, the highest honor given by the Caribbean division of the American Phytopathological Society.