Academic Background
Ph.D. Plant Breeding, Genetics and Genomics, University of Georgia, USA, 2025
M.S. Biology, concentration Plant Biology and Transcriptomics, New Mexico State University, USA, 2018.
B.S. Plant Sciences, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka, 2013.
Research Interest and Current Efforts
Vinavi Gamage, a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Department of Plant Pathology and Institute of Plant Breeding, Genetics and Genomics, is studying soybean resistance mechanisms to the soybean cyst nematode (SCN). Her research specifically focuses on the identification and functional characterization of SCN resistance genes.
Publications
Gamage VA, Strickland LW, Mitchum MG. A Rhizobium rhizogenes-mediated transformation method coupling CRISPR/Cas9-gene editing in soybean with high-throughput soybean cyst nematode greenhouse assays. BMC Methods 2025
*Usovsky M, *Gamage VA, Meinhardt CG, Dietz N, Triller M, Basnet P, Gillman JD, Bilyeu KD, Song Q, Dhital B, Nguyen A, †Mitchum MG, †Scaboo A. Loss-of-function of an α-SNAP gene confers resistance to soybean cyst nematode. Nat Comm, collection Molecular Basis of Plant-Pathogen Interactions 2023: 14(1):7629. *co-first authors; †co-corresponding authors https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-43295-y