Julia Barra Netto-Ferreira (she/her) - Ph.D. student

co-chaired Ph.D. student (with Chris H. Wilson, Agronomy)

Julia completed her B.S. in Agronomy at the Universidade Federal Rural do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She received her M.S. in Agronomy - Soil Science from the same institution. In her thesis, she studied the effect of granulation of NPK fertilizers with biosolid to enhance fertilizer use efficiency. Her main research interests lay in understanding how agroecosystems management impacts soil health and crop nutrition. Julia's Ph.D. research will evaluate chickpea's potential to serve as a dual-purpose crop (cash and cover crop) to replace bare fallow periods in Southeastern row crop systems. Her goal is to determine if and how management will affect soil health, fertility, and the productivity of crops in the rotation system.

Margaret Fernando (she/her) - Ph.D. Student

Margaret completed her B.S. in Chemistry at Iowa State University and continued with a M.S. in Plant Science at California State University, Fresno. While completing her M.S. degree she worked for the USDA-ARS in Parlier, Cal., and researched the impacts of native and introduced cover crops on soil health, crop-water dynamics, and weed pressure in a table grape vineyard. Margaret’s interests primarily involve agroecology and the effects of farming practices on soil health. Her Ph.D. research will compare organic and conventional systems, and her main objective is to determine whether the transition to organic can be optimized with regenerative management.  

Yaslin Gonzalez (she/her) - Ph.D. Student

Yaslin earned an M.S. degree in Soil and Water Sciences at the University of Florida in 2018. Yaslin’s thesis focused on characterizing the origins and quantifying the mass and distribution of deep podzolized carbon in the Southeastern United States Coastal Plain. Following graduation, Yaslin worked in the Department of Environmental Protection for three years, delineating wetlands and other surface waters across the state. Currently, Yaslin is pursuing a Ph.D., evaluating the effects of cover crop treatments on soil health in a perennial tree cropping system. Another objective of this study will be to determine which traditional and novel soil health indicators are best suited for Florida’s sandy soils.

Kendall Mackin (she/her) - M.S. Student

Kendall first joined the lab in 2021 as an undergraduate intern primarily assisting with a project looking at soil health related to different cover crop arrangements and fertilization approaches in organic vegetable production. She earned a B.S. in environmental science with a minor in plant science at the University of Florida in the spring of 2023. Since then, she has assisted with lab work for several different projects including work with nutrient cycling analyses and soil health indicators. She plans to expand her research efforts to focus on determining which soil health indicators are best suited for Florida sandy soils in citrus groves, and to assess soil health in sustainable grafted blueberry production.

Allison Schmidt (she/her) - OPS

Allison completed her B.S. in Plant Science at the University of Florida in 2020 and conducted research on the effects of collaborative workshops on the curricula of high school science educators. Since joining the lab in 2021, first as an OPS, she has measured soil health and nutrient cycling indicators for various projects. Her current research interests include utilizing cover crops for soil nutrient management in sustainable crop production. For her M.S. thesis, Allison evaluated fertilizer and sunn hemp cover crops as potential N additions in organic vegetable crop systems. Her goal is to determine the role of cover crops on soil fertility and crop development in Florida. Allison earned her M.S. in 2024.