Delta and Pine Land Company (NYSE: DLP) (“D&PL”), a leading commercial breeder, producer and marketer of cotton planting seed, today announced the addition of two PhD cotton breeders and geneticists to its research staff.  The new hires, Dr. Geeta Menon and Dr. Dewayne Deng, have highly specialized expertise in the latest plant breeding and genetic methods.  These new positions will contribute to the Company’s continued high tech breeding efforts – both in transgenic and molecular work and were added, in part, in anticipation of our planned future launch of new technologies.

“D&PL has a rich history in breeding and developing cotton varieties and we want to insure our future growth in this core area,” according to Dr. Bill Hugie, D&PL vice president of research.  “The two new positions we have recently created and filled will add depth and supplement our research programs with experience and expertise.  The hiring of Menon and Deng will enhance our transgenic and molecular breeding efforts, which will strengthen our global research team and provide farmers the best genetics and technology for decades to come.”

Menon’s focus is the Company’s transgenic efforts, leading introgression in D&PL’s greenhouses and working with D&PL’s DeltaMax joint venture.  She has experience in numerous crops including cotton, soybeans and corn.  The bulk of her professional career has been as a staff scientist at Syngenta where Menon developed a novel transformation method for canola oilseeds that was reported in Plant Cell Reports in November 2003.  During her post-doctoral work at the University of Wisconsin, she developed a visual marker selection system.  Her doctorate in crop science (plant breeding and genetics) is from North Carolina State University and she holds masters degrees in agricultural engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology and in botany from the University of Delhi (India).

Deng joins D&PL as associate molecular cotton breeder adding to the Company’s molecular program that has been building for the past five years.  With advanced degrees in both genetics and computer science, Deng brings a practical use of computer technology to the position and will be constructing a system to increase the utility of D&PL’s extensive molecular database.  He will work with D&PL’s molecular breeding program that includes developing markers for cotton and fingerprinting D&PL’s proprietary germplasm.   Deng has a doctorate in crop genetics and breeding from Nanjing Agricultural University (China) and masters degrees in computer science from Alabama A&M University and plant genetics and breeding from Hebei Agricultural University (China). 

Delta and Pine Land Company is a leading commercial breeder, producer and marketer of cotton planting seed.  Headquartered in Scott, Mississippi, with multiple offices in eight states and facilities in several foreign countries, D&PL also breeds, produces and markets soybean planting seed in the U.S.