Dr. Michael Bomford of the Land Grant Program's Community Research Service was an invited panelist at the Biofuels for Aviation Summit this week in Arlington, Virginia. The U.S. Air Force hosted the national summit to examine the potential to replace petroleum-derived jet fuel with fuel from renewable sources. The Air Force plans to certify all planes to be able to consume 50 percent alternative fuel by 2012. Commercial airlines are also exploring ways to reduce dependence on declining petroleum stocks. Dr. Bomford discussed potential impacts on the food supply in a talk titled "Can We Fly and Eat Too?"

Several Community Research Service researchers participated in the 2009 annual meeting of the American Society for Horticultural Science in St. Louis, Mo. Approximately 1,000 people from around the world attended the meeting. The following KSU researchers made presentations: Dr. Michael Bomford, Dr. George Antonious, Mr. Brian Geier, Ms. Sheri Crabtree, Dr. Kirk Pomper, Mr. Jeremiah Lowe, Dr. Hideka Kobayashi, Dr. Changzheng Wang, Mr. Shandeep Dutta, Dr. Li Lu, Mr. Kyle Schneider, Dr. Anthony Silvernail, Dr. Changzheng Wang, and Drs. Lingyu Huang. KSU faculty members Dr. Karan Kaul, Dr. Narayanan Rajendran and Dr. James Tidwell also participated. In addition to his presentations, Dr. Kirk Pomper coordinated and moderated a workshop titled “Native Fruits of the Midwest” in which he presented a talk titled “Pawpaw and the American Persimmon: Niche Tree Fruit Crops for the Midwest and Eastern United States” that was co-authored by Sheri Crabtree and Jeremy Lowe.

12