A delegation led by the President and Co-Founder of 2Blades Foundation Dr. Diana Hovarth will visit the West Africa Centre Crop Improvement (WACCI), University of Ghana from March 13 to 14, 2024 to explore strategic collaboration for agricultural development.
2Blades is a charitable organization dedicated to plant science innovations to combat crop diseases by collaborating with leading scientists to advance understanding and develop disease-resistant crops.
Dr. Horvath previously served as Science Director at ATP Capital, a New York venture capital firm that invested in companies developing agricultural biotechnologies. Focusing on technology and intellectual property, she helped to build and manage a portfolio of companies involved in forestry biotechnology, transcriptome and proteome analysis, small molecule discovery, and embryonic stem cells. Her interests are in the delivery of seeds with improved disease resistance, particularly for subsistence farmers. She received her Ph.D. in biochemistry and molecular biology from Northwestern University.
Joining Dr. Horvath on the visit is Dr. Kamil Witek, Group Leader at The Sainsbury Laboratory in Norwich, UK. 2Blades’ focus is on discovering and advancing technologies that prevent or reduce crop disease to improve agricultural output and the lives of people around the world. Currently, the group led by Kamil is aiming at delivering Asian Soybean Rust (ASR) resistant soybean for smallholders in sub-Saharan Africa. To achieve this goal, the group is leveraging legumes genetic resources together with proprietary 2Blades technologies. Earlier, as a team leader in 2Blades, Kamil focused on using natural plant diversity and state-of-the-art technologies to develop durable genetic resistance to ASR and devastating corn diseases in collaboration with industry. Before joining the 2Blades group, Kamil was a post-doctoral researcher in Prof. Jonathan Jones’ group at The Sainsbury Laboratory, where he created germplasm collections and developed novel techniques to clone a variety of functional plant immune receptors. Kamil was awarded his PhD by Institute of Biochemistry and Biophysics PAS in Poland, where he studied interactions between potato and major viral pathogens.
The visiting delegation will present a seminar on their operations globally and engage with the WACCI story, laying the groundwork for productive discussions.