Amir Ibrahim

Areas of Expertise

• Wheat Breeding and Genetics

Professional Summary

Research

Dr. Ibrahim is a professor and the project leader of the Small Grains Breeding program. His responsibilities include management of oat cultivar development for the entire state of Texas and wheat cultivars for South and Central Texas. Other responsibilities include procurement of grant funding, graduate student training, and conducting research relevant to wheat and oats genetic improvement. Dr. Ibrahim released and co-released 30 wheat and 3 oat cultivars. Dr. Ibrahim’s work relies on a statewide collaborative team approach that includes breeders, molecular geneticists, bioinformaticists, pathologists, physiologists, agronomists, economists, and end-use quality specialists. He also collaborates closely with USDA Agricultural Research Service scientists at Lincoln, Nebraska, Manhattan, Kansas, and St. Paul, Minnesota, and with public and private wheat breeders across the U.S. Great Plains and the Gulf and Atlantic regions. In addition, he collaborates with scientists at the International Center for Maize and Wheat Improvement (CIMMYT) and the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA). He is currently involved in international collaborative research in Mexico, Australia, Sudan, Egypt, Turkey, Tunisia, and the Republic of Georgia. His current research interests include mapping of genes and quantitative trait loci (QTL) associated with biotic and abiotic stress tolerance, end-use quality characteristics, germplasm diversity and genetic distance, yield per se, and synthetic wheat. His specific research interests regarding hybrid wheat include developing tools and germplasm necessary for hybrid wheat production, including sterility mechanisms, heterotic pools, and the genomic information necessary for efficient prediction of hybrid performance. Dr. Ibrahim also works on high throughput phenotyping using UAS. Dr. Ibrahim has published 132 refereed journal articles, 40 Extension articles, 13 technical report and book chapters, and 116 abstracts.

Teaching

Dr. Ibrahim teaches a graduate level course in Experimental Designs in Agriculture (SCSC 660). This course is designed to teach students fundamental principles of experimental designs in agricultural sciences. Emphasis includes factorial designs, predicting outputs, covariance analysis, and procedures to analyze unbalanced experimental designs as they relate to common agricultural research projects. Computer programming of common statistical software is also covered in this course. Dr. Ibrahim also teaches an undergraduate course in Crop Stress Management (SCSC 402).

Multi-state Wheat Rusts Evaluation Nursery

Support Staff and Students

Abdullah | Mustafa Cerit | Geraldine Opena | Bryan Simoneaux | Luke Whiteley