Inside Iowa State

Jan. 16, 2009

Quisenberry named vice president for research and economic development

by Annette Hacker, News Service

Sharron Quisenberry, professor of entomology and dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, is Iowa State's new vice president for research and economic development.

Quisenberry will join ISU on April 1. She succeeds John Brighton, who retired from the university last spring. Ted Okiishi, professor emeritus of mechanical engineering, has served as interim vice president for research and economic development.

"Sharron Quisenberry brings outstanding vision and talent to the position of vice president for research and economic development," said executive vice president and provost Elizabeth Hoffman. "We are very excited she will be coming back to the Iowa State family."

Quisenberry has been agriculture dean at Virginia Tech since 2003. Previously, she was dean of agriculture, director of the Montana Agricultural Experiment Station, and professor of entomology at Montana State University, Bozeman. From 1995 to 1999, Quisenberry headed the entomology department at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. She also served on the faculty of the University of Idaho, Moscow; and Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge. She was an assistant professor of entomology at Iowa State from 1980 to 1982.

In 2002, Quisenberry was appointed by President George W. Bush to serve on the Board for International Food and Agriculture Development, a position she held through 2007. Quisenberry is internationally recognized as an expert on plant-insect interactions and plant resistance to insects. She is a fellow and past president of the Entomological Society of America.

Quisenberry received a B.S. Ed. degree in biology (1966) from Truman State University, Kirksville, Mo.; a master of arts in environmental biology (1975) from Hood College, Frederick, Md.; and a master of science (1977) and doctorate (1980) in entomology from the University of Missouri, Columbia.

Alex King, director of the U.S. Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory, chaired the search committee for the vice president for research and economic development.

Sharron Quisenberry, dean of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Virginia Tech, becomes Iowa State's new vice president for research and economic development on April 1.