Dr. Maricelis Acevedo is Director of the Feed the Future Insect-Resistant Eggplant Partnership and a Research Professor of Global Development at Cornell University’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS). She also serves as Adjunct Associate Professor of Plant Pathology and Plant-Microbe Biology in the School of Integrative Plant Science in CALS. In 2020 Dr. Acevedo became the Director for USAID Feed the Future Insect-Resistant Eggplant Partnership. Bt eggplant adoption in Bangladesh has significantly reduced the need to utilize insecticide in farmers’ fields while increasing crop yields.

Prior to joining Cornell, Acevedo was the cereal rust pathologist and assistant professor in the Plant Pathology Department at North Dakota State University in Fargo, ND. In 2010, she was among the first recipients of the Jeanie Laube Borlaug Women in Triticum Early Career Award.