The primary task of this lab is to develop biological control technologies to suppress crop disease occurrences. The effort involves searching for beneficial or antagonistic microorganisms, developing and testing biological control agents in lab and field experiments, exploiting microbial biotechnology, and mass production of promising biocontrol agents. Biological control agents encompass microbial pesticides (algae, bacteria, fungi, protozoa or viruses), agricultural antibiotics, natural plant-derived pesticides, biochemical pesticides (pheromones, hormones or plant growth regulators), and plant-incorporated protectants (genetically-modified crops to resist diseases, insects or weeds).