Dr. Jose Leme graduated with his bachelor’s degree in Agronomic Engineering from Universidade Estadual de Londrina. For his master’s degree, he studied Precision Agriculture at Auburn University, followed by his Ph.D. at Virginia Tech with a focus on Plant Sciences. He started at SIU in Fall 2021, bringing his expertise in cannabis science and indoor cultivation systems. He has a joint appointment in the School of Forestry and Horticulture and the School of Biological Sciences. He is the principal investigator in the Cannabis Biology and Cultivation Systems lab, focusing on areas of controlled environment agriculture, plant secondary metabolites, nutraceutical/pharmaceutical biology, phenomics, plant physiology, biotic/abiotic stress, crop steering, and growing practices. His team aims to determine how to leverage environmental controls (light intensity, duration, quality, temperature, and CO2), plant nutrition, biostimulants, and hormones to improve plant production. Moreover, the research group is developing techniques to optimize plant yields and quality based on key crop steering traits that increase sustainability and efficiency via plant physiological, biochemical, and agricultural approaches.