Denis Persley, principal plant pathologist at the Queensland department of employment, economic development and innovation (Deedi) in Brisbane, is the winner of this year’s AUSVEG Researcher of the Year Award, sponsored by Bayer CropScience.
The award, presented at the 2011 AUSVEG National Convention in Brisbane last month, acknowledged Mr Persley’s work for the Australian vegetable industry of more than 40 years.
After rising through the ranks at the University of Queensland, Mr Persley’s research over the last 15 years has been to develop control measures for plant virus diseases in vegetable crops.
“In my role as a virologist, I identify virus resistance sources among crops, do some testing, look at strain variations, and work together with plant breeders to cross trait characteristics and develop resistant crop varieties,” Mr Persley said. “In the end, our work feeds back to the vegetable industry and finally to growers to enable them to grow healthier crops more profitably.”
Mr Persley’s published research has made him one of Australia’s leading authorities on plant virus pathogens, their vectors and control methods.
Over the last decade, Mr Persley has also been a team leader and mentor for plant pathologists at Deedi.
In the future, Mr Persley will continue his work at Deedi. His goal is to achieve the greatest possible control of virus diseases in the vegetable industry.
“At Deedi, we have great research facilities and we are continuously looking forward to new collaborations to advance in our ability to understand what the important virus diseases in vegetable crops are, how they spread and what effective management can look like,” he said.
The AUSVEG Researcher of the Year Award is sponsored by Bayer CropScience and acknowledges researchers who have a track record of research or extension work in fields which has advanced the vegetable industry long-term.
Bayer CropScience, a subsidiary of Bayer AG with annual sales of about EUR 6.83 billion (2010), is one of the world’s leading innovative crop science companies in the areas of crop protection, non-agricultural pest control, seeds and traits.
Bayer CropScience has a global workforce of 20,700 and is represented in more than 120 countries. The Australian head office is located in Melbourne.
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