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Science-based innovation for a changing world

Our Four Grand Challenges

Plants, their ecosystems, the soils in which they grow, and their associated microbes are foundational to our health and the health of our planet. In the face of a changing climate and growing pressure on natural and agricultural ecosystems, our research, teaching and outreach address these critical Grand Challenges.

Sustainable crop production and food security

Safeguarding future food security for all with sustainably managed nutritious crops in diverse production systems, under a changing climate, with minimal loss to weeds and pathogens.

Learn more about sustainable crop production and food security

Plants and ecosystem health

Integrating climate change mitigation and adaptation to secure ecosystem and human health and foster climate justice in diverse environments.

Learn more about plants and ecosystem health

Biodiversity, evolution, and molecular mechanisms

Understanding plant processes from molecular to ecosystem levels, and harnessing fundamental knowledge of plants, their associated microbes, and their relationships with the environment.

Learn more about biodiversity, evolution, and molecular mechanisms

Urban plants and ecosystem services

Enhancing food access and ecosystem services for equitable human and ecosystem health in high population areas.

Learn more about urban plants and ecosystem services

Make a difference! Study plant and agricultural sciences at Cornell.

Learn more about undergraduate majors in the School of Integrative Plant Science:

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tissue culture plants
Research areas in SIPS
measuring chlorophyll
Graduate studies in SIPS
field day
SIPS extension & outreach

School of Integrative Plant Science sections

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Cultivating an inclusive community

School of Integrative Plant Science News

Learn how our research in plant and soil sciences is advancing our knowledge and securing food security and environmental sustainability. Stories from the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences newsroom.

Hannah Marx collecting alpine plants in the field. Photo provided.

Field Note

Hannah Marx: enabling discoveries at the L.H. Bailey herbarium
Cornell’s Liberty Hyde Bailey Hortorium Herbarium is a curated collection of preserved plant specimens used as a library for studying plant biodiversity, identifying potential pharmaceuticals and tracing species evolution. It is the fourth...
  • Liberty Hyde Bailey Hortorium
  • School of Integrative Plant Science
  • Plant Biology Section
Margaret Frank speaking at an event

News

Programmable plant systems team selected for global food initiative

The Center for Research on Programmable Plant Systems (CROPPS) has been selected to help shape a new international effort to reimagine the future of food systems through the CIFAR Arrell Future of Food Initiative.

  • School of Integrative Plant Science
  • Plant Biology Section
schied with salt truck

Field Note

Grounds director leaves lasting legacy on campus landscape
Unlike most world-class universities, Cornell’s campus sits between two gorges, surrounded by native landscaping, meadows and carefully managed turfgrass — not lost among the buildings and asphalt of an urban environment. “Mother Nature has...
  • School of Integrative Plant Science

Land Acknowledgment

Cornell University is located on the traditional homelands of the Gayogo̱hó:nǫɁ (the Cayuga Nation). The Gayogo̱hó:nǫɁ are members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, an alliance of six sovereign Nations with a historic and contemporary presence on this land. The Confederacy precedes the establishment of Cornell University, New York state, and the United States of America. We acknowledge the painful history of Gayogo̱hó:nǫɁ dispossession, and honor the ongoing connection of Gayogo̱hó:nǫɁ people, past and present, to these lands and waters.

This land acknowledgment has been reviewed and approved by the traditional Gayogo̱hó:nǫɁ leadership. Learn more from the American Indian and Indigenous Studies Program website.