Contact: Kathleen Phillips, 979-845-2872, ka-phillips@tamu.edu
COLLEGE STATION – Two Texas A&M AgriLife Research scientists were named Faculty Fellow during the 2017 Texas A&M AgriLife Conference in College Station.
The Faculty Fellow title given to Dr. Luis Tedeschi and Dr. Jeffery Tomberlin are permanent and become a part of the individual’s title. AgriLife Research established the Faculty Fellows Program in 1998 to acknowledge and reward exceptional research faculty within the agency.
“Working in disparate fields — animal science and entomology — both Dr. Tedeschi and Dr. Tomberlin have made fundamental contributions that increase resilience and sustainability in agriculture,” said Dr. Craig Nessler, AgriLife Research director, College Station.
Tedeschi is a professor in the animal science department at Texas A&M University in addition to his role in AgriLife Research. He is known internationally for his research on “providing livestock with optimal nutrition while minimizing pollution and wasted feed,” according to the citation, and he developed mathematical models to assist with obtaining that information.
Because of Tedeschi’s research, the citation noted, “producers, researchers and students can more easily solve problems in ruminant nutrition; feedlot managers can maximize profits; and livestock product can become more sustainable.”
In the past five years, his research has been supported with more than $1 million in grants and contracts.
He served on various national committees aimed at improving livestock production and is involved in six professional organizations. He earned degrees at the University of Sao Paulo in Brazil and Cornell University before joining Texas A&M in 2005.
Tomberlin, who also serves as associate professor of entomology at Texas A&M, came to AgriLife Research in 2002 initially to study the use of insects to help estimate the time of death in criminal cases. Since then, his research has broadened to include a recent discovery of how to use insects as a highly cost-effective and sustainable source of protein in fish food, according to the citation.
His research has attracted more than $2.2 million in the past five years and the results of his studies are widely published and cited worldwide. He is active in various U.S. forensic science associations and has served as American Board of Forensic Entomology president.
Tomberlin has degrees from the University of Georgia and Clemson University.
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