Texas Tech University College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources.
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Research Focus

Dr. Thea Wilkins’ research focus is on the improvement of crops in her state-of-the-art, multidisciplinary lab, utilizing genetics, biotechnology, bioinformatics, genomics, biochemistry, and breeding applications.  Wilkins and her team investigate global genomic approaches, looking into what genes are required, how those genes are regulated, manipulated, and ultimately, if crop quality is improved. 
“We use molecular breeding to apply the latest in DNA marker technology, or use biotechnology to manipulate genes,” says Wilkins.  Ultimately, this leads to allelic genetic diversity to identify snips; Wilkins’ major focus is cotton fibers, but also researches peanut, cacao, knafe, and okra.  “We can expand genomic tools from cotton and apply those to “gene poor” species,” she says.

 

Importance of Graduate Students

Graduate students are the “heart of the lab, really a symbiotic relationship” according to Dr. Wilkins.  Wilkins believes it is important for students to take their professional development seriously.   “We provide the training and exposure…while students become well-rounded, well-balanced, with technical and analytical skills, as well as excellent written and oral communication skills,” she says.

 

Research Future

Currently, Texas Tech has the largest cotton genome sequencing project in the world.  “The door is now open to having faster, more available resources to having a gene sequence in-hand,” says Wilkins. 
She will continue to research genes linked to drought-tolerance in the form of snips, for molecular markers in breeding.  Wilkins and her team hope to” investigate cotton maturity at the mechanical level and interpret that biologically in a way that makes sense to us.”  In the future, Wilkins hopes to harness the latest technologies to develop mapping populations, continuing the way forward for cotton research at Texas Tech.

 

Thea Wilkins Lab

Texas Tech Emerging Technology Fund Site

 

Thea Wilkins, Ph.D. -Professor of Cotton Genomics