The Department of Plant Pathology at Ithaca is one of the oldest (established in 1907) plant pathology departments in the United States. The Department strives to provide a progressive, balanced program of fundamental and applied research, teaching, training for service to international agriculture, and assistance to growers and the general public through outreach programs. The Department is based on the third and fourth floors of the Plant Science Building, with several research programs (and faculty offices) in adjacent Bradfield Hall and in the nearby Dimock and Virology/Nematology Laboratories. Faculty members and several professors emeriti have offices in the Plant Science Building. Most graduate students also are assigned desk space in that building.

Plant Science Building

Plant Science Greenhouses

Facilities in the Plant Science Building include a departmental computer facility and a staffed photographic laboratory. (In addition, most laboratories are equipped with computers.) Instructional facilities include teaching laboratories specially equipped for graduate courses, the H.H. Whetzel Seminar Room, and others equipped with modern audiovisual equipment. The Virology-Nematology Laboratory for research and teaching, the Federal Golden Nematode Research Laboratory, and the A.W. Dimock Controlled Environment Laboratory for research in dendropathology, floriculture pathology, and epidemiology of plant diseases are a short walk away. Controlled environment chambers, some designed specifically for studies on effects of environmental variables on plant diseases, are also located in this building. By arrangement with other departments, graduate students have access to other special equipment, including the most advanced analytical equipment.

Uihlein Farm

Cornell Campus

The Department of Plant Pathology at Ithaca is equipped with greenhouse facilities, and land for field plots is available. Thousands of acres of woodlands, bogs and other natural areas, located within a few minutes of campus, serve as excellent mycological collecting grounds. The Cornell Plant Pathology Herbarium (CUP) in Ithaca is the fourth largest fungal herbarium in North America. It includes over 300,000 specimens of diseased plants and fungi and houses an extensive image collection documenting the last century of plant pathology, mycology, and agricultural practice. Albert R. Mann Library, one of the Cornell University Library system's nineteen unit libraries, supports instruction, research, and extension programs of the Field of Plant Pathology as well as other fields within the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. The collection covers a wide range of cross-cutting basic and applied sciences pertinent to studies in Plant Pathology and allied disciplines.

Cornell Clock Tower

Lettuce Field

The professorial staff at Ithaca is assisted by approximately 75 full-time employees; these include postdoctoral associates, laboratory technicians, experimentalists, an administrative staff and clericals, greenhouse and field assistants, a photographer, and herbarium curator. The Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research , founded in 1924, moved to new facilities on the Ithaca campus in 1978. Although the Institute is an independent nonprofit corporation, it has close ties with Cornell University and the Department of Plant Pathology. Members of its staff may become members of the graduate fields and participate in graduate education. Currently, two Institute staff members are members of the Field of Plant Pathology.

The Cornell Campus

The New York State Agricultural Experiment Station