Felipe Barrios Masias

Post-doctoral associate: fbarrios@ucdavis.edu

My interest focuses on plant-environment interactions and how traits affect resource use efficiency at the ecophysiology and community levels. Different morphological, physiological and phenological traits are responsible for the improved crop performance observed in the last few decades, but little information is known about them. Understanding how traits interact and the tradeoffs related to crop performance under different environmental conditions can help breeders and crop managers to implement strategies for crop adaptation to future climate change scenarios. In addition, the study of traits can contribute to improve crop productivity under low input systems, e.g., some organic systems and traditional farming in developing countries. Integrating plant traits with practices that rely on above- and below-ground diversity, niche differentiation and species complementarity and competition, among others, can contribute to increase yields by the efficient use of resources and minimizing the impact to the environment.

Project descriptions:

•  Partial root drying technique under alternate furrow irrigation for California processing tomatoes and its effects on water use efficiency. Alternate Furrow Irrigation in Tomatoes  Poster Barrios-Masias and Jackson 2011
• Crop evolution and changes in the suite of traits of California processing tomatoes Tomato cultivar evolution and traits
• Determinate growth, obscure veins and water use efficiency in introgression lines of processing tomatoes Poster/Barrios-Masias et al. 2010
• Cultivar diversity of processing tomato increases ecosystem functions and services Tomato Cultivar Diversity