Richard D. Berger
Education
Ph.D., University of Wisconsin, 1962
My research interest is in quantitative epidemiology, particularly the intensification of disease in time and space. Various plant pathosystems, including diseases of unknown etiology, can be chosen as a topic of study. We develop models and simulators to help us to interpet the peculiarities of natural epidemics, and these models are also used to devise ways to manage plant diseases. We examine various techniques, including video imagery, to improve our assessments of the amount of host stress caused by disease and other factors. I teach the course, "Epidemiology of Plant Disease," which also has a hands-on laboratory section. International projects provide an added stimulus to study epidemiology under different sets of host-pathogen-environmental conditions.