Visiting Scientist - Zhenhai Cui

Zhenhai Cui is a visiting scientist at Zhang Lab. He is an associated professor in Shenyang Agricultural University, China. His research focus on maize molecular breeding. Selecting fast dehydration of kernel maize lines is an essential key for mechanical harvest. Husk traits are highly related to dehydration of kernel. Two GWAS and QTL analysis of husk traits papers have been published by Cui in 2016 and 2018. These results dissect the genetic basis and identify QTL controlling the phenotypic variation of husk traits. In ZZlab, Cui further studies husk traits by BLINK in GWAS and gBLUP in GS. Several novel candidate genes of husk have been found in his newest work. GS of husk provide useful information to facilitate breeders improving husk traits in their breeding programs. In addition, Cui also works on dynamic GWAS of the decay of chlorophyll in maize leaf and husk after Pollination. These two set of unbalances timepoint data include 0.1 million phenotype measurements in total. It is really a challenge to extract functional traits in bulk of mess data and perform GWAS to understand dynamic regulation in molecular level.
Contact Info.
Zhenhai Cui, Ph.D.
130 Johnson Hall
Department of Crop and Soil Sciences
Washington State University
Pullman, WA 99164-6420, USA
Email: zhenhai.cui@wsu.edu