Cucurbit downy mildew exhibits significant long distance dispersal within the continental United States. The disease is characterized by annual extinction and recolonization cycles that make it an excellent model system to understand and quantify epidemic expansion in both time and space. Using disease records collected as part of a cucurbit downy mildew monitoring system, the temporal and spatial extent of the disease in the US has been established. Further, the risk of disease outbreak in the eastern US has been determined and provides a basis for deploying disease monitoring resources in a cost effective manner.

Bio

Dr. Peter Ojiambo was born and raised in Kenya and earned his BSc (Agriculture) and MS (Plant Pathology) at the University of Nairobi. Following completion of his MS program, he joined the International Potato Center in Nairobi as a potato pathologist in 1996. He later earned his PhD from the University of Georgia, Athens, in 2004. He was subsequently hired as a Plant Pathologist at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, Ibadan, Nigeria in 2006. He later joined the faculty in the Department of Entomology and Plant Pathology at NC State University in 2008, where he is a Full Professor and University Faculty Scholar. His research program at NC State focuses on theoretical and applied epidemiology of plant diseases and pathogen population biology. Dr. Ojiambo served as Senior Councilor-at-Large for the American Phytopathological Society from 2019 to 2020. He is currently a member of the Advisory Council for the USDA Southern Region IPM Center based in Raleigh, North Carolina. Dr. Ojiambo is a recipient of the Hewitt and Syngenta awards from the American Phytopathological Society for significant scientific contributions in plant pathology.