A graduate research assistants at the Virginia Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech has received an outstanding student award from the Virginia Tech Graduate School.

Genetics, bioinformatics, and computational biology student Konstantinos Krampis, from Arta, Greece, was recognized as the university’s Outstanding Interdisciplinary Program Student.

The Outstanding Interdisciplinary Program Student award honors a student that is enrolled in a Virginia Tech interdisciplinary Ph.D. degree program and demonstrates an academic contribution at the graduate level across a minimum of two academic colleges; engages in academic efforts that expand and promote the concept of interdisciplinary studies; and demonstrates originality, clarity, and effectiveness in the presentation of interdisciplinary ideas in teaching, research, or service.

Krampis received a bachelor’s degree in molecular biology from the University of Athens, Greece, in 2003. Krampis works with faculty from four interdisciplinary research groups at Virginia Tech and Ohio State University, including Tyler and Virginia Tech Professor Saghai Maroof from the Department of Crop and Soil Environmental Sciences. The goal of the collaborative project is to develop a better understanding of the mechanisms used by the pathogen P. sojae to infect and cause disease in its plant host.

As part of his Ph.D. dissertation work, Krampis developed a computer software application to discover new genetic markers that will aid in the study of soybean disease resistance. The use of this application for genetic marker discovery identifies hundreds more markers than could be discovered by conventional laboratory techniques. Krampis’ work helped the groups uncover valuable information that can also be used by researchers working to improve the disease resistance of this economically important crop.

Virginia Bioinformatics Institute at Virginia Tech has a research platform centered on understanding the “disease triangle” of host-pathogen-environment interactions in plants, humans and other animals. By successfully channeling innovation into transdisciplinary approaches that combine information technology and biology, researchers at the institute are addressing some of today’s key challenges in the biomedical, environmental and plant sciences.

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