Welcome to the Smith Lab website!

Water tower on campus.
Field
Silphium flower with butterfly.
Field
Plants in greenhouse.
Silphium flowers.

About Us

We are a research group in the Department of Agronomy and Plant Genetics at the University of Minnesota - St. Paul Campus. Led by Professor Kevin Smith, our lab is officially recognized as the barley breeding and genetics group, however we now conduct breeding experiments on three plants species:

Barley

Hordeum vulgare L.

Oats

Avena sativa L. 

Silflower

Silphium integrefolium Michx.

Our research foci are just as diverse as the list of species we work on. Projects cover many various topics, including genomewide selection, agronomics, mapping and dissection of genetic loci and exploration of genetic diversity.

We are a mid-sized research family, with 1 principal investigator, 4 technicians, 1 visiting technician, 1 visiting scientist, 1 graduate student, and several undergraduate research assistants!