ARS Presents Awards for Delivering New Research to Market

BELTSVILLE, Md., Dec. 5--Research to boost the citrus and cotton industries has netted technology transfer awards for two Agricultural Research Servicescientists. ARS is the chief research agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Scientists W. Stanley Anthony and Heinz K. Wutscher will receive gold plaques for outstanding efforts in moving their research from the laboratory to the marketplace. ARS Administrator Floyd P. Horn will present the awards at a Dec. 10 ceremony at the agency's Beltsville Agricultural Research Center.

Anthony is an agricultural engineer who heads the ARS Cotton Ginning Research Unit at Stoneville, Miss. He is being honored for using a variety of tools, including Cooperative Research and Development Agreements (CRADAs) with companies as well as publications, presentations and educational schools, to transfer innovations in cotton ginning to the national and international cotton industries.

Anthony recently developed a computerized system to measure cotton quality at various stages of gin processing, opening the door to "prescription" cotton ginning.

"Stanley Anthony's inventions have and will continue to have an enormous impact on the monetary returns to the public and on cotton quality in general," ARS Administrator Horn said in announcing the award.

Wutscher, a research horticulturist at the ARS U.S. Horticultural Research Laboratory in Orlando, Fla., is being honored for his role in the release and industry acceptance of citrus rootstock called "Swingle," now used by more than 40 percent of the U.S. citrus industry. The value of fruit produced on this rootstock is conservatively estimated at $2.4 billion a year.

"This rootstock was introduced at a time when catastrophic freezes and disease pressure forced growers to replace the traditional rough lemon and sour orange rootstocks," said Horn.

Two individuals and three groups of researchers will receive silver plaques from ARS for significant contributions in technology transfer. They are:

Research chemist Albert B. DeMilo, with the ARS Insect Chemical Ecology Laboratory in Beltsville, Md. DeMilo is being honored for technology transfer of novel repellents and scientific knowledge to the U.S. Department of Defense and private industry to develop protectants against disease-carrying pests such as mosquitoes.

David E. Zimmer, who retired from the ARS Office of Technology Transfer and is now an ARS collaborator. As ARS technology transfer coordinator for the agency's Mid South, South Atlantic and Southern Plains areas, Zimmer effectively marketed the research of more than 500 ARS scientists by generating Cooperative Research and Development Agreements (CRADAs) and promoting patents and licenses.

Nicanor J. Liquido and Roy T. Cunningham for their pioneering work with dye-based insecticides to control Mediterranean fruit flies. Both scientists are former directors of ARS' Tropical Fruit, Vegetable and Ornamental Crop Research Laboratory. They are currently collaborators with the research center.

Soil scientists Robert E. Sojka and Rodrick D. Lentz of the ARS Northwest Irrigation and Soils Research Laboratory at Kimberly, Idaho. They are being recognized for developing and transferring technology to use a substance called polyacrylamide (PAM) to reduce soil erosion in furrow-irrigated fields. The ARS scientists have shown that adding PAM to irrigation water at a rate of 10 parts per million--about 1 pound of PAM per acre--can cut field sediment losses to erosion by 95 percent.

Research hydraulic engineers Roger E. Smith of ARS' Water Management Research Unit, Fort Collins, Colo., and David C. Goodrich, David A. Woolhiser (retired) and hydraulic technician Carl L. Unkrich of the ARS Southwest Watershed Research Centerat Tucson, Ariz. The team is being honored for outstanding efforts in developing and transferring rainfall runoff and erosion modeling technology to improve flood and erosion estimates and enhance watershed management.

Scientific contact: Floyd P. Horn, Administrator, Agricultural Research Service, USDA, Washington, DC. Telephone (202) 720-3656.