Ram J. Singh, PhD is a plant research geneticist in the USDA-Agricultural Research Service, Soybean/Maize Germplasm, Pathology, and Genetics Research Unit, Department of Crop Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Dr. Singh received his PhD in Plant Cytogenetics under the guidance of a world renowned barley cytogeneticist the late Professor Takumi Tsuchiya from Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado. Dr. Singh isolated monotelotrisomics and acrotrisomics in barley, identified them by Giemsa C- and N-banding techniques, and determined chromosome arm-linkage group relationships.
Dr. Singh conceived, planned, and conducted excellent quality pioneering research related to many cytogenetic problems in barley, rice, wheat, and soybean and published in highly reputable national and international prestigious journals, including American Journal of Botany, Caryologia, Chromosoma, Critical Review in Plant Sciences, Crop Science, Euphytica, Genetic Plant Resources and Crop Evolution, Genetics, Genome, International Journal of Plant Sciences, Journal of Heredity, Plant Molecular Biology, Plant Breeding, and Theoretical and Applied Genetics. In addition, he summarized his research results by writing eighteen book chapters. Dr. Singh has presented research findings as an invited speaker at national and international meetings. He has edited a series entitled Genetic Resources, Chromosome Engineering, and Crop improvement. This series includes Grain Legumes (Volume 1), Cereals (Volume 2), Vegetable Crops (Volume 3), Oil Seed Crops (Volume 4), Forage Crops (Volume 5) and Medicinal Plants (Volume 6).
Dr. Singh assigned genome symbols to the species of the genus Glycine and established genomic relationships among species by a cytogenetic approach. He constructed a soybean chromosome map, for the first time, based on pachytene chromosome analysis and established all possible twenty primary trisomics and associated
eleven of the twenty molecular linkage maps to the specific chromosomes. Dr. Singh produced fertile plants with 2n = 40, 41, and 42 chromosomes, for the first time, from an intersubgeneric cross of soybean cv. "Dwight" (2n = 40) and Glycine tomentella, PI 441001 (2n = 78). The screening of derived lines shows that useful genes of economic importance from G. tomentella have been introgressed into soybean. He has U.S. patents on methods for producing fertile crosses between wild and domestic soybean species.
His book Plant Cytogenetics (first edition, 1993; second edition, 2003; third edition, 2007) is an ample testimony to his degree of insight in research problems and creative thinking. His books are widely used, worldwide, by students, scientists,
universities, industries, and international institutes. He is Chief Editor of the International Journal of Applied Agricultural Research and Editor of Plant Breeding and Biological Forum--an international journal. He has won many honors and awards such as Academic Professional Award for Excellence: Innovative & Creativity, 2000; Academic Professional Award for Excellence, 2007; College of ACES Professional Staff Award for Excellence--Research, 2009; The Illinois Soybean Association's Excellence in Soybean Research Award--2010; Foreign Fellow, National Academy of Agricultural Sciences, India--2011). He has collaborative projects with many countries.
