Welcome to the LSU School of Renewable Natural Resources! We are happy to restart our Research Matters publication after not publishing a 2024 edition due to the disruptions associated with vacating the RNR building for renovation.

As many of you know, the RNR building has been under renovation since January 2024. We are scheduled to reoccupy the building before the fall. The renovations will include a new roof, a heating and cooling system replacement, new chemical hoods, a new boiler, replacement of the lobby windows and exterior soffits, new flooring, paint, and interior and exterior LED lighting. All doors and paneling will be refinished. In addition, the elevators will be replaced later this year. These renovations were badly needed and very welcomed.

During renovations, we are spread across campus in multiple buildings. This has made faculty interaction and establishing a place for our students to call home challenging. Maintaining communications is a tribute to the RNR faculty and students. We look forward to reuniting this summer.

Six RNR faculty members left the school during the last year, either through retirement or by moving to academic positions at other universities or federal agencies. We have already filled our vacant instructor position with Dr. Jackie Satter, who joined us in January. We are in the process of interviewing and filling these positions over the next several months. We do miss Drs. Robert Reigh, Richard Keim, Bret Collier, Kevin Ringelman, Ashley Long and Kristin DeMarco, and we wish them great future success. Most are adjunct faculty members in the school, so our professional relationships with them continue. While the loss of productive faculty members saddens us, we have accepted this as an opportunity to reshape the school’s research, teaching and extension direction.

The school’s faculty and students continue to be distinguished by receiving awards for their research, teaching and outreach activities. Faculty continue to maintain productive research programs, with over $5 million in grants and contracts (about $300,000/research full-time equivalent), over 50 national and international presentations and 90 referred publications in the past year. Graduate students are routinely awarded research grants and noted for outstanding presentations at regional and national meetings.

I thank everyone who has generously supported our scholarship funds to assist deserving students. If you wish to contribute, please contact me by email or phone. We are always happy to connect with prospective and current students, alumni and other supporters. Let me know if you want to become more involved in the school.

We continue to ask each of you to give back to your school. Your contributions, regardless of size, allow us to enhance our programs. With alumni funding, we can send students to professional meetings, purchase vans to get students to the field, buy equipment to train students on the latest hardware and software, and many other educational enhancements. Your gifts make a difference!

As always, if you haven’t done so recently, please take a moment to update your RNR alumni profile at Survey | Qualtrics Survey Software.

We are optimistic about the future.

D. Allen Rutherford
Office: 225-578-4187
Cell: 225-954-0995
drutherford@agcenter.lsu.edu