Mishi Vachev

Mishi is a researcher in Sanu Arora’s lab focusing on advancing pea breeding.

Peas face many abiotic stressors, such as drought and freezing temperatures, and biotic challenges, such as pests and pathogens. Mishi is part of an international community of pea breeders and researchers that conduct field and controlled environment trials to assess how a diverse collection of pea lines responds to these abiotic and biotic stressors. Mishi uses this data to identify well-performing lines and develop markers breeders can use to develop new pea cultivars.

Mishi also studies resistance to downy mildew of pea, a disease that is prevalent in the UK and Europe and causes substantial yield loss. She is working to identify genes associated with resistance to the disease and to develop markers for breeders.