Russ Sanders is director, end use markets and biofuels for Pioneer Hi-Bred, a DuPont Company. He is responsible for Pioneer’s strategies to develop grains for specific downstream market uses. He also leads Pioneer’s biofuels business initiative and is a member of the management team for DuPont Biofuels. In this role, he coordinates biomass feedstock strategy development at Pioneer to complement DuPont’s processing technologies. Sanders joined Pioneer’s nutrition and industry markets group in 1996 and then transitioned to optimum quality grains, a DuPont/Pioneer joint venture where he served as vice president for sales and marketing. Prior to joining DuPont/ Pioneer, he was senior vice president of marketing and sales for Premium Standards Farms, one of the largest vertically integrated pork production companies. Earlier in his career, he served as chief executive officer of the National Pork Producers Council for seven years, headquartered in Des Moines. He is a graduate of Iowa State University with a BS in farm operations. He is a past recipient of the ISU College of Agriculture’s Floyd Andre Award, recognizing distinguished service to agriculture.

Joe P. Colletti is a professor and senior associate dean for the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. His areas of Interest are economics of short-rotation woody crops, agroforestry systems, integration of forestry and agriculture via mathematical programming models, and optimizing private forest resource management. He received his BS, in forestry at Humboldt University, his MS in forest economics at University of Wisconsin–Madison, and his PhD in forest economics at University of Wisconsin–Madison

Ken Moore is professor of agronomy at Iowa State University where he has been a faculty member since 1993. He holds a BS (1979) degree from Arizona State University and MS (1981) and PhD (1983) degrees in agronomy from Purdue University. He held faculty positions at the University of Illinois (1983–87) and New Mexico State University (1987–89), and was a USDA/ARS research agronomist and adjunct faculty member at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln (1989–93). His research interests include development of improved systems for the production and utilization of biomass and forage crops. He is director of the master of science in agronomy distance education program and Crop Adviser Institute at Iowa State University. He teaches graduate courses on the design and analysis of agronomic experiments (field plot technique) and crop management and ecology and co-teaches another on publishing in plant science journals. He has worked on collaborative research and education projects in Morocco, Costa Rica, and New Zealand where he was a senior research fellow with AgResearch Grasslands in 1998. Moore served as president of the Crop Science Society of America (CSSA, 2004) and is currently president of the American Society of Agronomy (ASA). He served on the editorial boards of Agronomy Journal and Crop Science, and was the founding editor of the e-journal Crop Management. He is co-editor of Forages Volume I: An Introduction to Grassland Agriculture (6th ed.) and Forages Volume II: The Science of Grassland Agriculture (6th ed.). Moore is a member of Gamma Sigma Delta, Phi Kappa Phi, and Sigma Xi and has been recognized with Outstanding Young Scientist and Merit Awards by the American Forage and Grassland Council and the Young Crop Scientist Award by CSSA. He is a fellow of both CSSA and ASA.

Andy Heggenstaller earned a BS in agronomy at Penn State University and MS degrees in sustainable agriculture and Eecology and evolutionary biology at Iowa State University. Currently, he is pursuing PhD degrees in agronomy and biorenewable resources technology at Iowa State University, where he works with faculty across several departments to investigate opportunities for greater and improved use of biorenewable resources. His doctoral dissertation focuses on the development of cropping systems for high-output, high-efficiency biomass feedstock production and environmental enhancement. Projects comprising his dissertation include investigations of annual and perennial biomass crops as well as experiments assessing the potential for integrating feedstock production and conversion by cycling nutrients between crop fields and biorefineries.

Ben Goff is currently a graduate student in the agronomy department at Iowa State University under Ken Moore and Steven Fales. His thesis is on the use of winter annuals and sorghums in a double-cropping system for biomass production. He is originally from Grafton, West Virginia; and graduated form West Virginia University in 2007 with a BS in agronomy. He is expected to graduate from ISU in the spring of 2010 with an MS in crop production and physiology and a graduate minor in biochemistry.

Emily Heaton earned her BS in crop sciences at the University of Illinois and is currently completing a PhD comparing the performance and qualities of Miscanthus with switchgrass in Illinois. She is lead author to two research articles on the production and economics potential of Miscanthus in the U.S. Emily also assists on the family farm in Monticello, which currently includes the largest stands of Miscanthus in Illinois. Emily worked with Steve Long in coordinating a special research initiative at the University of Illinois that aims to establish Illinois as a center for the research and development of biomass crops.

Roger W. Elmore is an extension corn agronomist and professor of agronomy at Iowa State University. He was born and raised on a grain and livestock farm in north-central Illinois near Princeton. Following his undergraduate degree from Illinois State University, he was a Peace Corps volunteer in Malaysia working with a crop diversification program in paddy rice-based cropping systems. His graduate work at the University of Illinois focused on corn, soybean, and grain sorghum intercropping systems. Part of this research was in Puerto Rico. After receiving his PhD, he worked 24 years for the University of Nebraska with cultural practices for irrigated corn and soybean systems with some work with winter wheat and grain sorghum. In the early 1990’s Elmore and his family spent nearly a year in Argentina working with and learning from Argentine agronomists in the Venado Tuerto area of Santa Fe. Consulting trips have since taken him to China, Ghana, and most recently to Haiti. In 2005 he joined the agronomy faculty at Iowa State University, where he concentrates on development of practical management information for corn growers.

Lisa Schulte is a professor in natural history of Iowa vertebrates, dynamics of forest stands, ecosystem management, and landscape ecology and natural resource management. The focus of her research is on ecosystem patterning and dynamics—with special emphasis on long time periods and broad spatial scales—and sustainable land management. This research falls within the discipline of landscape ecology and involves field- and computer-based research projects. Her forest-related research assesses (1) change in regional ecosystems of the U.S. lake states, (2) opportunities for coordination of forest management practices across private ownership boundaries, (3) the maintenance of oak ecosystems within the Midwest Driftless Area, (4) avian community response to spatial patterns created by gap-based silviculture, and (5) long-term forest response to catastrophic windthrow and salvage logging. Agroecological projects address the strategic perennialization of agricultural landscapes and include assessing (1) the acceptability of perennial plantings to rural stakeholders, (2) the effects of federal agricultural policy on landscape change, and (3) the effect of landscape heterogeneity on natural enemy insect populations. Schulte seeks an integrated approach in her research on sustainable land management; ecological and socioeconomic dimensions are of interest and considered where possible. She received her BS in biology at the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire, her MS in Biology at University of Minnesota, Duluth, and her PhD in forestry at University of Wisconsin–Madison.

Richard Hall is a professor for renewable resources, silviculture, genecology, and advanced forest ecology and silviculture. His research focuses on genetic selection and short-rotation silviculture. He is currently involved in the selection of genetically improved cottonwoods, aspens, and other tree species for use in biofuels and new products industries. Hall is also a member of the interdepartmental genetics major faculty and part of the interdepartmental program in ecology and evolutionary biology (EEB). He has been a member of the forestry faculty at Iowa State since 1974. He received his BS in forest management at Iowa State University. He received his PhD in plant breeding/plant genetics (forestry) at University of Wisconsin– Madison.

Antonio Mallarino is a professor in agronomy at Iowa State University. His research focuses on cost-effective and environmentally sound management practices for phosphorus and potassium (especially in conservation tillage) including soil and tissue testing, fertilizer placement, and precision farming technologies. Extension and other activities include support to extension for programs related to phosphorus and potassium, supervising the ISU Soil Testing Laboratory, and developing fertilizer recommendations. He received his BS in agronomy and animal science at University of Uruguay. He received his MS in soil fertility, and crop production and physiology at Iowa State University, and his PhD in crop production and physiology at Iowa State University.

Matt Helmers is an assistant professor and extension agricultural engineer in the Department of Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering at Iowa State University. His research and extension focus at Iowa State is in the areas of water quality and water resources management. In particular, he is studying water quality effects of agricultural best management practices including strategic placement and design of buffer systems and methods to improve water quality in tile-drained landscapes. He is active in investigating the impacts of cropping practices, fertilization practices, and subsurface drainage management practices on drainage water quality. His extension program is focused on education of producers and other stakeholders on the impacts of agricultural practices on water quality and methods to minimize these impacts.