Dr Richard Richards: breeding better wheat

Dr Richard Richards leads research to breed high performance crops for Australia at CSIRO Plant Industry.

• 1 December 2005 | Updated 14 October 2011

Overview

• Current activities
• Background
• Academic qualifications
• Achievements

Current activities

Dr Richard Richards is working to understand the genetic and physiological basis of the variation in growth, development and yield of wheat. He wants to use this understanding to breed higher yielding wheats.

Elite wheat lines developed by Dr Richards and his group are currently in advanced yield trials throughout Australia. Several new wheat cultivars with higher yield potential are currently in commercial production in Australia.

Background

Dr Richards was appointed lecturer in the Botany Department at the University of Western Australia, Perth, in 1975 and joined CSIRO Plant Industry in Canberra, Australian Capital Territory (ACT), in 1976.

Dr Richards left CSIRO to join the University of California, Davis, California, USA, as a research agronomist, but returned to CSIRO Plant Industry in Canberra, ACT, in 1981.

Academic qualifications

Dr Richards completed undergraduate studies in science at the University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, prior to doing a Doctorate at the University of Western Australia, Perth.

Achievements

Dr Richards has been an invited speaker at many national and international symposia.

He was elected:

• President of the Wheat Breeding Society of Australia in 1994
• Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering in 2004. 

Dr Richards has published more than 100 scientific papers. He is on the Editorial Board of three international journals.

A team led by Dr Richards was recently awarded a CSIRO Medal for improving the water-use efficiency of wheat.

Dr Richards is also Principal Scientist for a national wheat breeding company HRZ Wheats Pty Ltd.

See a list of scientific papers published by Dr Richards on the next page.