Carolyn Lawrence-Dill

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Carolyn Lawrence-Dill
Carolyn Lawrence-Dill (cropped).jpg
Born (1974-05-18) May 18, 1974 (age 51)
El Paso, Texas, U.S.
Alma mater University of Georgia
Texas Tech University
Hendrix College
Known forPlant science data access and availability; gene function prediction tools and resources; making phenotype descriptions computable, research community-building
Scientific career
Fields Plant Biology
Bioinformatics
Institutions Agricultural Research Service, Iowa State University, Colorado State University
Doctoral advisor R. Kelly Dawe & Russell L. Malmberg

Carolyn Joy Lawrence-Dill (born May 18, 1974) is an American plant biologist and academic administrator. She develops computational systems and tools to help plant science researchers use plant genetics and genomics data for basic biology applications that advance plant breeding.

Contents

Early life and education

Carolyn Joy Lawrence-Dill, née Cogburn, was born in El Paso, Texas. She grew up in Throckmorton, then moved to Cleburne in 1989. She graduated in 1992 from Cleburne High School. Lawrence-Dill earned a B.A. degree in biology from Hendrix College in 1996. She received her M.S. degree in biology in 1997 from Texas Tech University where she worked on cotton physiology, and her Ph.D. degree in botany in 2003 from the University of Georgia. [1] Her doctoral dissertation focused on integrating traditional and computational methods for inferring gene function in plants. [2]

Career

Following her formal education, Lawrence-Dill served for two years as a postdoctoral researcher under the direction of Volker Brendel [3] at Iowa State University.

In the summer of 2005, Lawrence-Dill began work as a research geneticist for the USDA-ARS. She served as the director of MaizeGDB, the maize model organism database through 2013. [4] In 2014 she joined the faculty of Iowa State University as an associate professor in the Departments of Genetics, Development and Cell Biology and Agronomy. During her time at the institution, she established the Office of Research and Discovery. [5] She was promoted to the rank of professor in 2019. In 2021, she was named Associate Dean for Research and Discovery for the Iowa State University College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and Associate Director of the Iowa Agriculture and Home Economics Experiment Station. In 2024, she joined Colorado State University as Dean of the College of Agricultural Sciences. [6]

Research

Lawrence-Dill's research focuses on mapping genomes and gene elements, [7] [8] [9] [10] predicting protein function, [11] [12] inventing new ways to link genes to phenotypic descriptions and images, [13] [14] developing ways to compute on phenotypic descriptions, [15] [16] [17] [18] organizing broad datasets for community access and use, [19] [20] [21] and developing computational tools that enable others to do all of these sorts of analyses directly. Although research and development projects are across the plant kingdom generally, much of her work focuses on maize.

Genomics

Lawrence-Dill has advanced plant scientists' ability to access plant genomics resources by sequencing and assembling genomes, annotating structural elements including genes, regulatory elements and CRISPR sites to genomes, and creating tools that enable researchers to analyze gene expression data.

Phenomics

Lawrence-Dill has advanced plant scientists' ability to compute on phenotype directly via connecting image-based phenotypes to genomics data, crowdsourcing for image-based machine learning, managing information for field and controlled environment high-throughput phenotyping, and computing on phenotypic descriptions.

Leadership and policy

Data sharing

Much of the work Lawrence-Dill has published seeks to advance data sharing to enable researchers to make use of others' findings, as some scientists harbor concerns about data sharing that those who generate materials and data will not derive prominence from downstream use and benefits derived from their own data. [22] However, generally limiting access to data prevents researchers from being able to test whether research results are reproducible. With respect to genomics data and materials, limiting access to digital sequence information (DSI) relevant to specific germplasm can keep researchers from being able to identify biological materials for novel research applications.

Climate and genetic engineering

Lawrence-Dill regularly addresses timely topics like climate change and genetic engineering, advising colleagues to engage in discussions on these topics with colleagues in other disciplines, with policymakers, and with the general public. Her guidance focuses on finding shared values, articulating social, environmental, and economic opportunities, and appealing to a better future rather than negative consequences.

In 2016, Lawrence-Dill and sociologist Shawn Dorius began work to better understand where negative public opinions on GMOs originate. While investigating how genetic engineering and biotechnology were portrayed in US media outlets, information on Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections emerged, with English language Russian state news from RT and Sputnik being ordered to register as foreign agents. [23] This led the team to look into news reported by RT and Sputnik, where they found their portrayal of GMO topics to be very different from that of US media. [24] Their research shows that Russian state news about GMOs were almost entirely negative, with seemingly intentional mis-associations linking GMOs with controversial, unrelated, and distasteful topics (e.g., topics on abortions of Zika-infected fetuses and the Trans-Pacific Partnership). The team hypothesized that this activity could aim not only to stir up controversy in the US, but also to serve economic interests in Russia given that agriculture is Russia's second largest industry. They also argue that spreading disinformation can erode public trust in science, which they called "an institutionalized pillar of Western intellectual tradition". [25]

While their findings were under peer review, the Des Moines Register released an article [25] describing their findings on February 25, 2018. The researchers released a preprint of the article via the SocArXiv [23] within a day to ensure that detailed materials, methods, and interpretations of the data were fully available. A media frenzy followed with coverage in more than 80 newspapers, online websites, and radio broadcasts, with audio coverage through National Public Radio's Marketplace (February 28, 2018) and Iowa Public Radio's River to River (March 2, 2018). There was even a political cartoon released by Greg Kearney, [26] and Bill Gates defended GMOs via a Reddit Ask Me Anything [27] discussion in the midst of the coverage. The peer-reviewed publication was accepted on March 11, 2018 and was published on April 30, 2018. [28] Subsequent to media coverage of the GMO-Russia connections, reports of other seemingly unrelated hot topics showed signs of Russian influence with apparent intention to cause discord, [29] with demonstrations of influence campaigns emerging on wide-ranging topics from energy to human rights to international trade.

Scientific community building

Lawrence-Dill has brought together researchers across many communities to coordinate their work. This includes building consensus for standards and nomenclature, [30] [31] founding community organizations, [32] [33] and encouraging others through mentorship and training opportunities. [34]

Awards

Elected service

References

  1. ↑ Lyell, Kelly (June 20, 2014). "Colorado State University hires new deans for two academic colleges". Fort Collins Coloradoan. Retrieved 2025-09-14.
  2. ↑ Dissertation Carolyn Joy Lawrence: A combined bioinformatic/molecular-based approach to understanding molecular motors in plants - website of the Library of the University of Georgia. Archived 2020-10-17 at the Wayback Machine
  3. ↑ Brendel, Volker. "Volker Brendel, Professor of Biology". Department of Biology, Indiana University.
  4. ↑ "Lawrence-Dill moves up to rank of professor". Iowa State University. August 26, 2022. Retrieved 2025-09-14.
  5. ↑ Outcalt, Christopher (June 4, 2024). "Carolyn Lawrence-Dill named dean of College of Agricultural Sciences". College of Agricultural Sciences News - Colorado State University.
  6. ↑ "Lawrence-Dill named dean of CSU College of Agricultural Sciences". The Fence Post.
  7. ↑ Andorf, Carson M.; Kopylov, Mykhailo; Dobbs, Drena; Koch, Karen E.; Stroupe, M. Elizabeth; Lawrence, Carolyn J.; Bass, Hank W. (December 2014). "G-Quadruplex (G4) Motifs in the Maize (Zea mays L.) Genome Are Enriched at Specific Locations in Thousands of Genes Coupled to Energy Status, Hypoxia, Low Sugar, and Nutrient Deprivation". Journal of Genetics and Genomics. 41 (12): 627–647. doi: 10.1016/j.jgg.2014.10.004 . PMID   25527104.
  8. ↑ Law, MeiYee; Childs, Kevin L.; Campbell, Michael S.; Stein, Joshua C.; Olson, Andrew J.; Holt, Carson; Panchy, Nicholas; Lei, Jikai; Jiao, Dian; Andorf, Carson M.; Lawrence, Carolyn J.; Ware, Doreen; Shiu, Shin-Han; Sun, Yanni; Jiang, Ning; Yandell, Mark (1 January 2015). "Automated Update, Revision, and Quality Control of the Maize Genome Annotations Using MAKER-P Improves the B73 RefGen_v3 Gene Models and Identifies New Genes". Plant Physiology. 167 (1): 25–39. doi:10.1104/pp.114.245027. PMC   4280997 . PMID   25384563.
  9. ↑ Campbell, Michael S.; Law, MeiYee; Holt, Carson; Stein, Joshua C.; Moghe, Gaurav D.; Hufnagel, David E.; Lei, Jikai; Achawanantakun, Rujira; Jiao, Dian; Lawrence, Carolyn J.; Ware, Doreen; Shiu, Shin-Han; Childs, Kevin L.; Sun, Yanni; Jiang, Ning; Yandell, Mark (1 February 2014). "MAKER-P: A Tool Kit for the Rapid Creation, Management, and Quality Control of Plant Genome Annotations". Plant Physiology. 164 (2): 513–524. doi:10.1104/pp.113.230144. PMC   3912085 . PMID   24306534. S2CID   11525262.
  10. ↑ Manchanda, Nancy; Portwood, John L.; Woodhouse, Margaret R.; Seetharam, Arun S.; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J.; Andorf, Carson M.; Hufford, Matthew B. (2 March 2020). "GenomeQC: a quality assessment tool for genome assemblies and gene structure annotations". BMC Genomics. 21 (1): 193. doi: 10.1186/s12864-020-6568-2 . PMC   7053122 . PMID   32122303.
  11. ↑ Wimalanathan, Kokulapalan; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J. (3 May 2021). "Gene Ontology Meta Annotator for Plants". bioRxiv   10.1101/809988 .
  12. ↑ Wimalanathan, Kokulapalan; Friedberg, Iddo; Andorf, Carson M.; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J. (April 2018). "Maize GO Annotation-Methods, Evaluation, and Review (maize-GAMER)". Plant Direct. 2 (4): e00052. doi:10.1002/pld3.52. PMC   6508527 . PMID   31245718. S2CID   90386060.
  13. ↑ Cho, Kyoung Tak; Portwood, John L.; Gardiner, Jack M.; Harper, Lisa C.; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J.; Friedberg, Iddo; Andorf, Carson M. (28 August 2019). "MaizeDIG: Maize Database of Images and Genomes". Frontiers in Plant Science. 10: 1050. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2019.01050 . PMC   6724615 . PMID   31555312.
  14. ↑ Zhou, Naihui; Siegel, Zachary D.; Zarecor, Scott; Lee, Nigel; Campbell, Darwin A.; Andorf, Carson M.; Nettleton, Dan; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J.; Ganapathysubramanian, Baskar; Kelly, Jonathan W.; Friedberg, Iddo (30 July 2018). "Crowdsourcing image analysis for plant phenomics to generate ground truth data for machine learning". PLOS Computational Biology. 14 (7) e1006337. Bibcode:2018PLSCB..14E6337Z. doi: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1006337 . PMC   6085066 . PMID   30059508. S2CID   51881800.
  15. ↑ Oellrich, Anika; Walls, Ramona L; Cannon, Ethalinda; Cannon, Steven B; Cooper, Laurel; Gardiner, Jack; Gkoutos, Georgios V; Harper, Lisa; He, Mingze; Hoehndorf, Robert; Jaiswal, Pankaj; Kalberer, Scott R; Lloyd, John P; Meinke, David; Menda, Naama; Moore, Laura; Nelson, Rex T; Pujar, Anuradha; Lawrence, Carolyn J; Huala, Eva (2015). "An ontology approach to comparative phenomics in plants". Plant Methods. 11 (1): 10. doi: 10.1186/s13007-015-0053-y . PMC   4359497 . PMID   25774204. S2CID   18382593.
  16. ↑ Braun, Ian; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn (2018). "Computational Classification of Phenologs Across Biological Diversity" (PDF). Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Biological Ontology: 2. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2019-01-14. Retrieved 2020-10-16.
  17. ↑ Braun, Ian R.; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J. (10 January 2020). "Automated Methods Enable Direct Computation on Phenotypic Descriptions for Novel Candidate Gene Prediction". Frontiers in Plant Science. 10: 1629. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2019.01629 . ISSN   1664-462X. PMC   6965352 . PMID   31998331. S2CID   210117404.
  18. ↑ Braun, Ian R.; Yanarella, Colleen F.; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J. (20 May 2020). "Computing on Phenotypic Descriptions for Candidate Gene Discovery and Crop Improvement". Plant Phenomics. 2020: 1–4. doi: 10.34133/2020/1963251 . PMC   7706311 . PMID   33313544.
  19. ↑ AlKhalifah, Naser; Campbell, Darwin A.; Falcon, Celeste M.; Gardiner, Jack M.; Miller, Nathan D.; Romay, Maria Cinta; Walls, Ramona; Walton, Renee; Yeh, Cheng-Ting; Bohn, Martin; Bubert, Jessica; Buckler, Edward S.; Ciampitti, Ignacio; Flint-Garcia, Sherry; Gore, Michael A.; Graham, Christopher; Hirsch, Candice; Holland, James B.; Hooker, David; Kaeppler, Shawn; Knoll, Joseph; Lauter, Nick; Lee, Elizabeth C.; Lorenz, Aaron; Lynch, Jonathan P.; Moose, Stephen P.; Murray, Seth C.; Nelson, Rebecca; Rocheford, Torbert; Rodriguez, Oscar; Schnable, James C.; Scully, Brian; Smith, Margaret; Springer, Nathan; Thomison, Peter; Tuinstra, Mitchell; Wisser, Randall J.; Xu, Wenwei; Ertl, David; Schnable, Patrick S.; De Leon, Natalia; Spalding, Edgar P.; Edwards, Jode; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J. (December 2018). "Maize Genomes to Fields: 2014 and 2015 field season genotype, phenotype, environment, and inbred ear image datasets". BMC Research Notes. 11 (1): 452. doi: 10.1186/s13104-018-3508-1 . PMC   6038255 . PMID   29986751.
  20. ↑ Lawrence, C. J. (1 January 2004). "MaizeGDB, the community database for maize genetics and genomics". Nucleic Acids Research. 32 (90001): 393D–397. doi:10.1093/nar/gkh011. PMC   308746 . PMID   14681441.
  21. ↑ Duvick, J.; Fu, A.; Muppirala, U.; Sabharwal, M.; Wilkerson, M. D.; Lawrence, C. J.; Lushbough, C.; Brendel, V. (23 December 2007). "PlantGDB: a resource for comparative plant genomics". Nucleic Acids Research. 36 (Database): D959 –D965. doi:10.1093/nar/gkm1041. PMC   2238959 . PMID   18063570. S2CID   10046054.
  22. ↑ Longo, Dan L.; Drazen, Jeffrey M. (20 January 2016). "Data Sharing". New England Journal of Medicine. 374 (3): 276–277. doi: 10.1056/NEJMe1516564 . PMID   26789876.
  23. 1 2 Dorius, Shawn F; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J (27 February 2018). "Sowing the seeds of skepticism: Russian state news and anti-GMO sentiment". GM Crops & Food. 9 (2): 53–58. doi:10.1080/21645698.2018.1454192. PMC   6277062 . PMID   29561212.
  24. ↑ Galeon, Dom (2018-02-28). "To create conflict, Russians fuel GMO debate". Futurism. Retrieved 2025-09-14.
  25. 1 2 Eller, Donnelle. "Anti-GMO articles tied to Russian sites, ISU research shows". Des Moines Register. Archived from the original on 17 October 2020. Retrieved 15 October 2020.
  26. ↑ Kearney, G. M. "Drawing Attention". Archived from the original on 17 October 2020. Retrieved 15 October 2020.
  27. ↑ Gates, Bill. "r/IAmA - Comment by u/thisisbillgates on "I'm Bill Gates, co-chair of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Ask Me Anything."". reddit.
  28. ↑ Dorius, Shawn F.; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J. (3 April 2018). "Sowing the seeds of skepticism: Russian state news and anti-GMO sentiment". GM Crops & Food. 9 (2): 53–58. doi:10.1080/21645698.2018.1454192. PMC   6277062 . PMID   29561212. S2CID   4051135.
  29. ↑ Timberg, Craig; Romm, Tony. "These provocative images show Russian trolls sought to inflame debate over climate change, fracking and Dakota pipeline". Washington Post. Retrieved 20 October 2020.
  30. ↑ Gray, John; Bevan, Michael; Brutnell, Thomas; Buell, C. Robin; Cone, Karen; Hake, Sarah; Jackson, David; Kellogg, Elizabeth; Lawrence, Carolyn; McCouch, Susan; Mockler, Todd; Moose, Stephen; Paterson, Andrew; Peterson, Thomas; Rokshar, Daniel; Souza, Glaucia Mendes; Springer, Nathan; Stein, Nils; Timmermans, Marja; Wang, Guo-Liang; Grotewold, Erich (January 2009). "A Recommendation for Naming Transcription Factor Proteins in the Grasses". Plant Physiology. 149 (1): 4–6. doi:10.1104/pp.108.128504. PMC   2613739 . PMID   19126689.
  31. ↑ Lawrence, Carolyn J.; Dawe, R. Kelly; Christie, Karen R.; Cleveland, Don W.; Dawson, Scott C.; Endow, Sharyn A.; Goldstein, Lawrence S.B.; Goodson, Holly V.; Hirokawa, Nobutaka; Howard, Jonathon; Malmberg, Russell L.; McIntosh, J. Richard; Miki, Harukata; Mitchison, Timothy J.; Okada, Yasushi; Reddy, Anireddy S.N.; Saxton, William M.; Schliwa, Manfred; Scholey, Jonathan M.; Vale, Ronald D.; Walczak, Claire E.; Wordeman, Linda (11 October 2004). "A standardized kinesin nomenclature". Journal of Cell Biology. 167 (1): 19–22. doi:10.1083/jcb.200408113. PMC   2041940 . PMID   15479732. S2CID   30027277.
  32. ↑ Carroll, April Agee; Clarke, Jennifer; Fahlgren, Noah; Gehan, Malia A.; Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J.; Lorence, Argelia (January 2019). "NAPPN: Who We Are, Where We Are Going, and Why You Should Join Us!". The Plant Phenome Journal. 2 (1): 1–4. doi: 10.2135/tppj2018.08.0006 . S2CID   186567373.
  33. ↑ Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn J.; Schnable, Patrick S.; Springer, Nathan M. (July 2019). "Idea Factory: the Maize Genomes to Fields Initiative". Crop Science. 59 (4): 1406–1410. doi: 10.2135/cropsci2019.02.0071 .
  34. ↑ Lawrence-Dill, Carolyn; Heindel, Theodore; Schnable, Patrick; Strong, Stephanie; Wittrock, Jill; Losch, Mary; Dickerson, Julie (16 May 2018). "Transdisciplinary Graduate Training in Predictive Plant Phenomics". Agronomy. 8 (5): 73. Bibcode:2018Agron...8...73L. doi: 10.3390/agronomy8050073 .
  35. ↑ "Maize Genetics Cooperation honors 2 faculty". Iowa State University. Retrieved 2023-09-20.
  36. ↑ "Women of Achievement". ywca. Archived from the original on 2020-10-17. Retrieved 2020-10-15.
  37. ↑ "IPPN Home". www.plant-phenotyping.org. Archived from the original on 2020-10-01. Retrieved 2020-10-15.
  38. ↑ "North American Plant Phenotyping Network". nappn.plant-phenotyping.org. Archived from the original on 2020-06-12. Retrieved 2020-10-15.
  39. ↑ "DivSeek International Network - A Global Community Driven Not-for-Profit Organization". DivSeek Intl. Archived from the original on 2020-10-17. Retrieved 2020-10-15.
  40. ↑ "Maize Genetics Executive Committee". maizegdb.org. Archived from the original on 2020-05-13. Retrieved 2020-10-15.

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