The National Academy of Sciences has elected Jeffrey Ross-Ibarra, professor in the Department of Evolution and Ecology at University of California, Davis, as a member. His election was announced April 28.
Ross-Ibarra is one of 120 members and 25 international members elected this year in recognition of distinguished and continuing achievements in original research. Membership in the academy is considered one of the highest honors a scientist can achieve.
Ross-Ibarra studies the evolutionary genetics, adaptation and domestication of maize and its wild relatives. His research combines field studies, laboratory experiments and computational modeling to investigate how natural selection, genetic drift and environmental change shape genetic diversity in plant populations.
By studying how maize has adapted to environments ranging from tropical regions to high-altitude and northern climates, Ross-Ibarra aims to identify traits that could help crops remain productive under future climate conditions. His research has broad implications for crop resilience and agricultural sustainability.
Much of his work focuses on using evolutionary history to better understand how crops may respond to future environmental pressures. By examining how maize adapted to different climates and growing conditions over thousands of years, his work on naturally occurring genetic variation could help crops withstand heat, drought and other climate-related challenges.
Origins of maize
Ross-Ibarra is widely recognized for reshaping scientific understanding of maize evolution and domestication. In a landmark 2023 paper published in , he and collaborators reconstructed the origins of modern maize, showing that today’s crop descends from a hybrid created more than 5,000 years ago in central Mexico. Their findings revealed that hybridization with a wild highland relative played a critical role in maize becoming one of the world’s most successful and widely cultivated staple crops.
“I am very pleased to see Professor Ross-Ibarra receive this well-deserved honor,” said Mark Winey, dean of the College of Biological Sciences. “His contributions to our understanding of the evolutionary biology of maize represent not only outstanding basic science, but applications to real-world crop science challenges for a changing climate. He is truly an extraordinary scientist.”
Ross-Ibarra’s work also explores the deep co-evolutionary relationship between humans and maize, integrating genetics, archaeology and evolutionary biology to better understand how the crop and human civilizations shaped one another over thousands of years in cultures across the Americas.
In January 2024, Ross-Ibarra received the National Academy of Sciences Prize in Food and Agriculture Sciences, which recognized his “pioneering studies on the evolutionary genetics of maize, a key crop species for global food production.” The award honored both the fundamental scientific importance of his research and its long-term applications for agriculture and food security.