Fellows List

Participation in this project helped me enlarge my real scientific field of vision. It gave me the opportunity to visit several genebanks and meet some interesting and important scientists. I met with Sir Otto Frankel and had many conversations about N. I. Vavilov and Plant Genetic Resources. The greatest impact on my career was the publication of my book “Vavilov and his Institute” in 1999. The year after, I became the Head of Department for the Vavilov Institute of Plant industry (VIR).

The fellowship had a major impact, in the sense that I got in contact with my heroes. Frankel was at the time, still able to receive me and I frequently interviewed him. I think it [the fellowship] should be a stepping stone, it is just the first step, it doesn’t stop there.

After two unsuccessful attempts, finally I was awarded the VFF in 2000. I grew up with pistachio and fascinated with its diversity and unknown genetics, I was determined to gain more insights into this area. Therefore, I improved my proposal and applied stronger every time. This achievement took my research on pistachio to a higher level and provided me more opportunities to continue my scientific goals.

The fellowship was instrumental to launching my academic career. As an international student from El Salvador in a U.S. university, I was very restricted in terms of the funding opportunities I could apply to. The VFF award allowed me to conduct a rigorous dissertation project in El Salvador, which not only allowed me to finish my doctoral degree, but also to find the academic path that I am following to this day.

The fellowship gave me the opportunity to discover further my own country's forest genetic resources by providing the means to travel and survey populations of endangered trees. It also gave me the opportunity to train undergraduate students in forestry in Benin and to collaborate with scientists in Brazil by working on the population genetics of African mahogany using techniques and primers developed on Brazilian mahogany. It made me a better scientist.

It was a very nice opportunity because [Bioversity] offers only one fellowship a year for the whole of Sub-Saharan Africa. The research I did was part of my PhD work and I hadn’t really finalized the funding aspects, so it was very useful to be able to collect and do my fieldwork. If I see myself: what I am today, all the knowledge I have, what I am doing, what I was able to do and learn from my past experiences, then, yes, in that sense, the fellowship was useful [in contributing to his career].

The fellowship provided me with the unique opportunity to spend a significant amount of time in the field working with farmers, their communities and local research partners. I gained a better appreciation for the challenges related to the sustainable production, marketing, and promotion of quinoa; and was also able to pilot test smallholder technology to facilitate the processing work of quinoa.

It was a wonderful opportunity for me to work on a very high potential project for the improvement of lentils. The work carried out for the project helped me to learn new molecular techniques and bioinformatics tools which strengthened my teaching and practical knowledge and presently, I am utilizing this in teaching postgraduate students.

Through the fellowship I gained much practical understanding of forest genetics research, both in the field and in the lab. On the other hand, it revealed to me how many more potential research areas are available and how much persistence is needed. I am grateful however, that I now have a larger international professional network within this field and the international exposure to new systems, societies and cultures has helped me adapt faster to my new job.

This experience has been tremendous for me. I come to it with a background of forestry, so having the opportunity to expand my breadth of the world of biodiversity has been great.

The VFF was a unique learning experience. It gave me the opportunity to actively participate in a real scenario of collaborative multidisciplinary research which enabled me to broaden and develop new scientific skills and insights.

I faced and overcame a lot of difficulties which are specific to developing countries. In addition, I made plenty of connections with staff in Bioversity and counterpart institutions. I also had lots of communication with local people. These experiences and connections are helping my present activities in India.

The fellowship experience was of great convenience to me, academically and professionally. The research project required the participation of different organizations locally and internationally, which was very useful since they provided advice and assistance for the field and laboratory work. Collaboration and knowledge exchange between researchers and institutions was also a very important achievement.

Through my postdoctoral fellowship in China I gained much experience, especially on molecular markers, genome mapping, tissue culture and gene transformation of Citrus. I also had the opportunity to contribute to international journals. It was very useful for me to work and have contact with the team at the National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement in HZAU.

A lot of input and ideas were gathered with colleagues who also helped to work out the concrete proposals for reducing Bioversity's impact on the environment. During my internship, I mastered my knowledge about an organization's impact on the environment, how to quantify it and how to reduce it. It was an exciting challenge.

The ASO fellowship was for me a great opportunity to deepen my investigation of the reproduction ecology of Sclerocarya birrea in West Africa. I sincerely felt honored to have been selected for this grant. It was an opportunity for me to collaborate with an international research institution and is an outstanding point in my CV as a junior researcher.

Participating in the IFAR fellowship enhanced my professional development.  My interaction with staff at Bioversity International Kampala Office strengthened my professional and personal linkages with Bioversity and the whole CGIAR family in general. I got a feel of how the CGIAR system operates and the professionalism involved.

The skills that I have learnt in relation to the identification of potential sources of drought, frost and salinity tolerance of field peas can be integrated into our breeding programmes. They will potentially reduce the time taken to release new cultivars with the required characteristics, and are applicable in any plant breeding programme across a range of desired characteristics, and will be extended to other pulse legume crops.

During four months of training and research work under the instruction of my supervisors and laboratory staff, I learnt a lot and acquired important skills in a wide range of research areas. The training gave me a valuable opportunity to update my knowledge on plant breeding and to learn techniques in virology and plant genetic resources conservation and utilization.

The internship gave me a lot more than I’d expected. It turned out that I had to work with a lot of scientists from all over the world, about environments that I wasn’t really personally familiar with. The scientists were always willing to share information and mingling with the people at the top is always fun.

Being part of a project of such a scale where I can learn from so many different countries, understand their reality and analyze their situation regarding on-farm conservation of tropical fruits has been quite enriching and challenging. Furthermore, experiencing such a great and at the same time traditional and modern city such as New Delhi, full of surprises every day, has exceeded my expectations.

The fellowship has given me a splendid opportunity to conduct research aimed at understanding the distribution and conservation status of a highly utilized, yet critically endangered medicinal plant. It feels good to know that my research will contribute positively towards the lives of the many people who rely on the species for their healthcare.

The training was very useful for me while working with my supervisor, Mr. Morimoto. I'd never worked in the field before, so I got a lot of basic skills and experience-based knowledge from him such as making good questionnaires, coordinating local people and so on. I was also impressed by the local people’s wide ecological knowledge on wildlife and how they used it efficiently in their lives.

The most important lesson was to try and understand farmers' perspectives in rural areas. In order to understand their situation, I had to do away with my fixed ideas and put myself in their shoes. It was my first time managing a field survey from A to Z. I learned to cooperate with research assistants, how to survive in a rural area and how to build good relationships with local people.

As winner of the 2012 VFF award, I surely hope to gain sufficient knowledge regarding the discrimination between tolerant and susceptible genotypes using molecular markers which enable the development of drought tolerant varieties. This award from Bioversity International could also be an entrance window to meeting various scientists from around the world and developing my knowledge in the area of marker assisted selection (MAS) for stress tolerance.

During the fellowship, I hope to learn how to phenotype and genotype grasspea germplasm for anti-nutritional factors and establish the link of drought and heat stresses with ODAP accumulation. The VFF fellowship experience will help me to establish myself as a keen researcher with an ability to plan, and execute sound experiments, record relevant observations, analyze and interpret results, and publish in good journals for the benefit of the society.

I found the internship experience highly fulfilling. The work was engaging and made a natural, practical extension of the questions I investigated for my masters using a moss mite natural model system regarding how habitat connectivity influences biodiversity and resilience.