Senait Senay

Senait D. Senay is an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Department of Plant Pathology at the University of Minnesota and Research Associate with the University's G.E.M.S/International Agro-Informatics Alliance (IAA) initiative. Senay's research focuses on developing and enhancing spatial models that can be used to predict the distribution of agricultural pests and diseases as well as research any interaction between these pests, their hosts and the environment. Senait is interested in working on climate change adaptation issues especially regarding the increased risk from alien invasive species on livelihoods, food safety and biodiversity. She believes it is important to develop strategies that counter homogenization of species distribution, as novel climates resulting from climate change create suitable habitats for invading species.

Her work as a Research Associate for the G.E.M.S/International Agro-Informatics Alliance (IAA) initiative involves developing pest risk models that can fully utilize Genomics, Environment, Management, and Socio-economic data which are accessible through the G.E.M.S platform that makes such multi-sourced data interoperable. Her active research area is to develop intuitive pest risk models that can provide realistic results through the use of un-orthodox data sources that affect pest emergence and establishment but were not usually accessible to conventional pest risk models due to challenge in data interoperability. At the International Science & Technology Practice & Policy (InSTePP) center, Senay works in collaboration with other fellows to integrate pest risk models within bio-economic risk models.