Dr. William Rutter

Dr. Rutter’s U.S. Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service (USDA ARS) page.

William Rutter (USDA-ARS) is a Research Plant Pathologist that focuses on developing resistance and management tools to control phytoparasitic nematodes on vegetable crops in the Southeast. Rutter’s is currently working to identify, characterize, and deploy new sources of nematode resistance in sweetpotato, pepper, watermelon, and cucumber. He is also working to develop new strategies for identifying, surveying, and quantifying parasitic nematodes in the field. Dr. Rutter received a Ph.D. in Genetics and Plant Pathology from Iowa State University while studying how cyst and root-knot nematodes interact with their plant hosts. As a postdoctoral researcher in the Kansas State University Department of Plant Pathology he studied the interaction between wheat stem rust and its bread wheat host. Dr. Rutter has been in his current position with the USDA-ARS since 2017.