Karen Massel

Karen is a Research Fellow in QAAFI at the University of Queensland whose research group is focused on the improvement of crops using genomic and biotechnological tools. She began her scientific journey through obtaining an Honours BSc in Pharmaceutical sciences (Genomics) from the University Ottawa where her honours focused on the impact of RNA stability in cold-treated wheat seedlings. From there she joined Ian Godwin's group in SAFS at UQ to start her PhD in developing and optimising biotechnological tools in sorghum to understand food and feed quality. As a research fellow, she has applied these initiatives to numerous tropical grain crops and using these tools to study a range of traits focused on understanding key developmental pathways.