AMES, Iowa — An Iowa State University poultry science researcher will be the new leader of the Egg Industry Center.
Susan J. Lamont, a C.F. Curtiss Distinguished Professor of Agriculture and Life Sciences and animal science professor, will become the center’s interim director effective April 1.
“I look forward to working with the Egg Industry Center and its excellent staff to fulfill the center’s mission of facilitating research and learning for egg producers, processors and consumers.”
She succeeds Hongwei Xin, a C.F. Curtiss Distinguished Professor of Agriculture and Life Sciences who has been the director of the Egg Industry Center since it was created in 2008. Xin has been named the dean for AgResearch at the University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture.
The Egg Industry Center works to add value to the nation’s egg industry by providing research and education for egg producers, processors and consumers through national and international collaboration. It is funded through a combination of sponsorships, donations and university support. The center is holding its annual issues forum April 16 and 17 in Kansas City.
Lamont joined Iowa State in 1983 as an assistant professor in the Department of Animal Science. Over the years she has been involved in research projects totaling more than $20 million. From 2001 to 2003, she served as head of the department.
Lamont began studying chickens in 1975 at the beginning of her graduate studies at the University of Illinois Medical Center, where she earned a doctorate in anatomy and immunology in 1980. Lamont earned a bachelor’s degree in biology in 1975 from Trinity Christian College. She received postdoctoral training in poultry genetics and immunology at the University of Massachusetts.