Crop & Soil Sciences: Personnel: Faculty
Nicholas S. Hill
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Academic Rank: | Professor |
| Academic History: | Ph.D., Kansas State University 1984 | |
| Area of Expertise: | Crop Physiology & Management | |
| Campus: | Athens | |
| Office Location: | 4101 Miller Plant Sciences Building | |
| Email: | nhill@uga.edu | |
| Phone: | 706/542-0923 | |
| Fax: | 706/542-0914 | |
| Shipping Address: | 3111 Miller Plant Sciences Building The University of Georgia Athens, GA 30602-7272 |
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| Additional Web site: |
Research, Teaching, and Extension Work
My research has focused on plant fitness components in mutualistic associations between endophytic fungi and cool season pasture grasses. Livestock toxicoses result when grazing endophyte-infected pastures, but removal of endophytes from pastures may result in pasture stand loss. By investigating the toxins produced by endophytes, documenting variability within plant populations, and investigating how they are metabolized within ruminant animals, several successful strategies have developed by which toxicosis has been overcome through plant breeding and livestock immunonology. Much of our efforts have been to establish robust, sensitive, and rapid immunological detection systems for identification of endophytes and quantitation of the toxins. This has permitted us to breed plants with reduced toxin loads and investigate the metabolic fate of livestock toxins in vitro and in vivo. This is a multi-team effort which includes other crop scientists, plant pathologists, animal and veterinary scientists. I teach an introductory course in Crop Science (CRSS 2010).