Sergio Moroni

Crop and pasture protection

Dr J Sergio Moroni

BSc in Agric., MSc and PhD in Plant Breeding (UofA, Canada)

Lecturer in Agronomy
Wagga Wagga
Building 286 Room 212

Dr Moroni graduated with a BSc Agric. (Plant Science) degree from the University of Alberta, Canada, before completing a MSc and then a PhD in Plant Breeding, also at the University of Alberta.

On completing his PhD Dr. Moroni was appointed to NSW Agriculture (now NSW DPI) as a Research Agronomist, focusing on crop germplasm tolerant to soils with subsurface acidity. This involved the identification and characterization of canola tolerant to high manganese as well as, wheat, barley and canola germplasm resistant to aluminium.

Dr Moroni joined CSU from 2003 to 2008 as a Post Doctoral Research Fellow and subsequently promoted to Research Fellow. The main research projects he worked on with at this time were "The contribution of subsoil constraints to canola yield decline" and "Determining differences between crop species in their ability to exploit remnant lucerne biopores and to capture surface and subsoil water".

Dr Moroni returned to NSW DPI in early 2008 to work in the development of drought tolerant canola germplasm.  Subsequently, Dr Moroni came back to CSU in early 2009 following his appointment to the position of Lecturer at the School of Agricultural & Wine Sciences.

Lecturer in Crop Science

Interested in plant-soil interactions for abiotic stresses including acid soil tolerance (eg. Al, Mn, pH), crop physiology (e.g. vernalisation, devernalisation, drought tolerance, micronutrient efficiency/deficiency) and soil impedance. This research has covered genetics, physiological and/or whole-plant level and has involved work in controlled environment facilities (glasshouse and plant growth chambers), soils- and nutrient solution- based systems, and in a specialized facility such as a Rhizolysimeter.  This has been complemented with physiological techniques at the plant and canopy levels and as well as the root (eg. minirhizotrons, microscopy, digital image analysis).

Current project:

GRDC funded: Developing new genetic approaches to decreasing the reproductive frost sensitivity of wheat ($1.3M)