V. Todd Miller

Taking the place of a 40-year veteran of the Louisiana sugarcane industry is no small task, so when LSU AgCenter plant pathologist Andre Gama replaced longtime researcher Jeff Hoy, he knew he had big shoes to fill. Due to his extensive travels, Gama’s own shoes were well worn, so he was up for the challenge. Gama grew up in Piracicaba, São Paulo, Brazil, and became interested in plant pathology during his junior year of college.

What did your undergraduate studies entail?

During my undergraduate studies at the University of São Paulo Luiz de Queiroz College of Agriculture, I researched the effects of brown and orange rusts of sugarcane on photosynthesis. A postdoctoral assistant I was working for recommended me to Richard Raid, a pathologist at the University of Florida, where I finished my degree researching pineapple rot of sugarcane in 2014.

Where did you conduct your post-graduate studies?

I applied for my master’s degree in my previous lab in Brazil and was given the choice to work on grapevines or citrus. The citrus project reeled me in because it involved developing an automated, online, decision-support system to aid growers in deciding the best time for fungicide applications based on weather forecasts and disease models.

I thought it was cool that the growers could use the online system to guide their fungicide applications because before that, they were spraying four to six times in a season without knowing if the conditions were conducive for the disease.

How exactly does that work?

Using mathematical models that correlate disease risk with weather variables like temperature and leaf wetness periods to guide sprays, our team was able to reduce fungicide applications by up to 75% per season with the same efficacy, reducing environmental impacts from fuels, fungicides and water usage and providing financial benefits for growers with a positive effect on yield.

Where did you get your doctoral degree?

I returned to Florida when the state was facing postbloom fruit drop in citrus. The University of Florida had a similar system for strawberries as Brazil had for citrus, so my professor collaborated with counterparts in Brazil to implement and design an automated system for orange production in Florida.

We validated the system for oranges, and it worked very well. This disease doesn’t occur every season, but the growers were spraying every year out of a sense of caution. There is now an app where producers get an alert on their phone when it’s the best time to spray.

How did you find your way to the LSU AgCenter?

I was working in the private sector on Huanglongbing, or citrus greening, a devastating disease that caused a steep decline in orange juice production in Florida. After a year and a half, I realized my true passion was teaching and putting my own research ideas to the test, so I told myself if a good academic job came up, I would apply for it. That’s when I saw the AgCenter position, giving me the opportunity to work with sugarcane again, which I hadn’t done since my undergrad days. I especially liked the job description, which was applied disease management, working directly with growers.

What are you currently doing in your AgCenter position?

I now get to teach epidemiology, describing how diseases grow in the field, become more severe and how to test ways to mediate that effect. I also provide free diagnostic services for sugarcane growers in Louisiana, sponsored by the American Sugar Cane League. To optimize the diagnosis for local growers, my team is working on improving methods for detecting sugarcane pathogens, including the causal agents of ratoon stunting disease and sugarcane leaf scald.

How does working in Louisiana and at the AgCenter differ from your previous academic stops?

Well, first, the food is amazing! And the growers are very curious and involved. The difference here is you have a sugarcane industry that is more composed of families rather than big corporations, which I really enjoy because I feel that we as researchers can make a bigger difference.

V. Todd Miller is a writer, editor and photographer in AgCenter Communications.

This article appears in the fall 2024 edition of Louisiana Agriculture magazine.

LSU AgCenter pathologist Andre Gama examines sugarcane for rust at the Sugar Research Station in St. Gabriel. Photo by V. Todd Miller