Charlie Anderson to lead Plant Biology intercollege graduate program
For the first time in almost three decades, the Huck Institutes' intercollege graduate degree program in plant biology has a new chairperson. Charles "Charlie" T. Anderson, professor and associate head of research and faculty success in the Department of Biology, succeeds outgoing chair Teh-hui Kao, who had served in the role since 1999.
Anderson’s research is centered around the dynamics of plant cell walls with the objective of better informing efforts to use plants as sustainable resources for food, materials and energy. His research team explores how plants capture carbon dioxide for use in photosynthesis, measures changes in wall architecture during growth, observes how interactions between cell wall components influence wall structure and remodeling, and seeks to identify and characterize new genes that influence cell wall dynamics.
A member of the Plant Biology program’s faculty since 2012, Anderson already has mentored a dozen of the program’s trainees. Now, he’s stepping into a role responsible for 44 graduate students spread across eight departments, with an incoming cohort of half a dozen new trainees set to join in August.
“I am delighted that Charlie Anderson has accepted the role and will lead the Plant Biology program,” said Huck Institutes Director Christina Grozinger. “Charlie’s research program is truly interdisciplinary, spanning detailed studies of the molecular architecture of cell walls to developing innovative strategies for biomaterial and bioenergy production.
“Charlie has long been a champion for students within the Plant Biology program and across the University, and he is clearly dedicated to developing training opportunities to help launch the next generation of plant scientists.”
Anderson’s predecessor, Distinguished Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Teh-hui Kao, is relinquishing a role he held for 26 years but will remain involved in the program in other capacities, such as organizing the weekly plant biology seminar series.
“Teh-hui leaves some very big shoes to fill,” said Anderson. “He has been a wonderful mentor to me, the other program faculty, and of course to our students. I’m very grateful for the amazing legacy he has built, and I hope I can continue to support the success of everyone in the program.
“Plant Biology is in an extremely strong position, being ranked as one of the top three plant biology graduate programs in the country, and as chair I will endeavor to maintain and enhance this position of prominence," Anderson added.
Aiming to build on the solid foundation left behind by Kao, Anderson said he plans to expand the faculty membership to encompass adjacent, plant-related fields and initiate community discussions about curriculum, both within the program and to build stronger life sciences offerings across all Huck graduate programs.
“One major challenge for any graduate program that provides rotations, such as Plant Biology, is matching students with faculty who have funded projects,” he said. “To empower our students to pursue research of their choice, I would like to help coordinate one or more training grant applications, for example through the NSF Research Traineeship program. I also plan to work closely with the newly reinvigorated Plant Institute — for which I currently serve on the executive committee — to bring world-leading facilities, instrumentation and technical staff to Penn State and provide the best possible training environment for our plant biology graduate students and other researchers across Penn State.”
Anderson obtained his bachelor of science in biology from the University of North Carolina before doing his doctoral work in cell and molecular biology at Stanford. He also undertook postdoctoral training at the University of California, Berkeley, before joining Penn State.