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Chase Stratton, Ph.D.

Chase Stratton

Assistant Professor

Campus Address: 20 Cecil Street, Cannon Hall, Room 108

Email: cstratton [at] desu.edu

Education

  • B.S., Virginia Commonwealth University
  • Ph.D., University of Vermont, 2018
  • Postdoctoral training: Crop Protection Ecology and Data Science, The Land Institute (non-profit organization), 2022

Research Interests

My research background is in sustainable pest management and data science. I study ways to manipulate agricultural settings with natural products that reduce insect pest presence or damage with minimal environmental impacts. I am generally interested in plant-insect-microbe interactions, chemical ecology, bioinformatics (specifically in the realm of plant phylogenies), cheminformatics, and writing code to assist in complex analyses. As the director of the Data Science Research and Education Hub at DSU Downtown, I am expanding the machine learning infrastructure available to DSU faculty and students and will provide training opportunities for anyone interested in exploring high-performance computing in their research. My current focus involves the development of an artificial intelligence called aiNsect. This digital brain will allow us to translate our research into agricultural, health, and basic ecological outcomes.

Research Expertise

  • Plant-Insect Interactions
  • Phytochemicals
  • Insect Behavior
  • Cheminformatics
  • Bioinformatics
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Data Analytics
  • Coding
  • Machine Learning

Consulting Experience

  • Consulting/collaborating with Aromatic Plants Research Center, 2022 - present.

Consultation Expertise

I have broadly applicable skills in data science and writing code for analyzing complex data. My research in artificial intelligence, plant polyculture compatibility, and plant-insect interactions generate massive datasets that we (myself and collaborators) develop software packages to speed up interpretation/processing for. We have a patent pending on a cheminformatics software, uafR (https://github.com/castratton/uafR) that uses published data on PubChem (https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/) to automate critical steps in a chemical analysis workflow. My general expertise includes sustainable pest management, plant-insect interactions, cheminformatics, plant phylogenetics (bioinformatics), and a growing footprint in machine learning.

Selected Publications

  • Elisabeth A. Hodgdon, Chase A. Stratton, Christine A. Hoepting, Andrea E. M. Campbell, Angela E. Gradish, Braden G. Evans, Rebecca H. Hallett, and Yolanda H. Chen. 2024 (In Press). Organic management of the invasive swede midge (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae) on Brassica vegetables: multiple dead-ends necessitate novel approaches. Journal of Integrated Pest Management. In Press.

  • Stratton CA, Ray S, Bradley BA, et al. 2022. Nutrition vs association: Plant defenses are altered by arbuscular mycorrhizal association not by nutritional provisioning alone. BMC Plant Biology. 22(1):400. doi: 10.1186/s12870-022-03795-3

  • Durr TD, Stratton CA, Dosoky NS, et al. 2022. Shared phytochemicals predict efficacy of essential oils against western flower thrips (Frankliniella occidentalis) in the greenhouse. Chemical and Biological Technologies in Agriculture. 9, 62. doi: doi.org/10.1186/s40538-022-00328-w

  • Ruiz KP, Bruce A, Chérémond NE, Stratton CA, et al. 2022. Field trapping and the flight capacity of Eucosma giganteana (Riley) (Lepidoptera: Tortricidae) in response to behaviorally active congeneric semiochemicals in novel Silphium agroecosystems. Insects, 13(4):350. doi: 10.3390/insects13040350

  • Hodgdon E, Hallett R, Heal J, Stratton CA, et al. In Press. Field tests of candidate pheromone blends show promise for mating disruption of the invasive swede midge (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae). The Canadian Entomologist.

  • Stratton CA, Hodgdon E, Rodriguez-Saona C, et al. 2019. Odors from phylogenetically-distant plants to Brassica repel an herbivorous Brassica specialist. Scientific Reports 9:10621. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-47094-8

  • Stratton CA, Hodgdon E, Zuckerman SG, et al. 2018. A single swede midge (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae) larva can render cauliflower unmarketable. Journal of Insect Science 18:1-6. https://doi.org/10.1093/jisesa/iey062

  • Hodgdon E, Hallett R, Stratton CA, et al. 2019. Diel patterns of emergence and reproductive behaviour in the invasive swede midge (Diptera: Cecidomyiidae). The Canadian Entomologist 151(4), 510-520. doi:10.4039/tce.2019.21

  • Chen YH, Gols R, Stratton CA, et al. 2015. Complex tritrophic interactions in response to crop domestication: predictions from the wild. Entomologia Experimentalis et Applicata 157:40-59. https://doi.org/10.1111/eea.12344

Grants

  • USDA-NIFA Multistate Hatch/Evans-Allen Grant. NE2001. co-PD. Active 2023 to 2025. Harnessing Chemical Ecology to Address Agricultural Pest and Pollinator Priorities.

  • NIH RCMI Data Science Supplement. 3U54MD015959-02S1. co-PD. $602,576. Interdisciplinary Health Equity Research Center.

  • NSF HBCU Excellence in Research. Planning Grant. 2332218. PI. 10/1/2023 - 9/31/2024. $99,138. aiNsect: a digital insect brain.

  • USDA-NIFA Postdoctoral Fellowship. 2021-67034-35135. PI. 6/15/2021 - 6/15/2023. $165,000. Phylogeny, chemistry, or fungal communities? Using big data to identify novel plant combinations that improve crop productivity and defense.