Chair
Juha Kantanen
Natural Resources Institute Finland
Jokioinen, Finland, Finland

Term of service (2nd, 2023-2027, Reindeer)

Professor Juha Kantanen, PhD, acts as a chair of the ISAG-FAO Advisory Group on Animal Genetic Diversity. He is a professor in animal genomics at the Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke). He is a leading expert in multidisciplinary and multinational studies on the examination of domestic animal genetic resources in Eurasian regions, with a particular focus on molecular and population genetics and genomics.

Co-Chair
Catarina Ginja
CIBIO-InBIO, Universidade do Porto, PT
Porto, Portugal

Term of service (2nd, 2021-2025, Cattle)

Catarina Ginja is the leader of the Archaeogenetics research group at CIBIO-InBIO, and an invited Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Sciences, University of Porto. She graduated in Zootechnical Engineering from the University of Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro-UTAD (2000) and obtained her MSc degree in Animal Science from the same university (2002). C Ginja completed a PhD degree in Animal Breeding and Genetics from the Technical University of Lisbon (2009). Following her research at the Veterinary Genetics Laboratory, she was invited to work as a Research Assistant at the University of California in Davis (2008-2010). In October 2010, C Ginja was awarded a Marie Curie grant to work at the Centre for Environmental Biology of Lisbon University and to launch an innovative archaeogenetics research. C Ginja is experienced in state-of-the-art technologies including the analysis of ancient genomes of domesticated animal species. She has a strong publication record in the field of population genetics and conservation of domestic animal genetic resources. In 2014, she was invited as chairperson and cattle representative of the FAO/ISAG Committee on Animal Genetic Diversity. She collaborates with Breeder Associations to define conservation and management measures.

Member
Paul Boettcher
FAO-AGAG
Rome, Italy

Term of service (Multiple, 2008-2027, Secretary)

Member
Licia Colli
Universita Cattolica Del S. Cuore
Piacenza (PC), Italy

Term of service (2nd, 2023-2027, Goat)

Member
Roy Costilla
AgResearch
Hamilton, New Zealand

Term of service (2nd, 2023-2027, Cattle Genomics)

Member
Richard Crooijmans
Wageningen University & Research
Wageningen, Netherlands

Term of service (2nd, 2023-2027, Pig)

Member
Jianlin Han
Yazhouwan National Laboratory
Sanya, China

Term of service (2nd, 2023-2027, Camelids and Yak)

Member
Mervi Honkatukia
Nordic Genetic Resource Center NordGen
Aas, Norway

Term of service (1st, 2023-2027, Poultry)

Mervi Honkatukia has been a section leader in Nordic Genetic Resource Center (NordGen) since 2018. Before that, she was a team leader in animal genetic resources and reproduction in Natural Resources Institute Finland. Honkatukia earned a master of science degree in agriculture from the University of Helsinki and a PhD in physiology and genetics from the University of Turku. Her key research themes include implementation and development if strategic conservation initiatives aimed at preserving the genetic diversity of farm animals, assessment of various factors influencing the biodiversity and adaptability of farm animals, contributing to their long-term survival, and exploring farm animal genomics and transcriptomic profiles to uncover valuable insights into their genetic makeup and regulatory mechanism.

Member
Johannes Lenstra
University of Utrecht
Utrecht, Netherlands

Term of service (3rd, 2023-2027, Cattle Genetic Diversity)

Johannes Arjen (Hans) Lenstra was born on August 17, 1950, in Zaandam, the Netherlands. He graduated in Biochemistry from the University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands. In 1979 he completed his PhD, a study on the structure and evolution of pancreatic ribonuclease, at the State University of Groningen. After his PhD he was awarded a 3-year Fellowship from the Dutch Cancer Society and worked at the University of Nijmegen. Between 1982 and 1984 he held a postdoctoral position at the State University of Leiden. Since 1984 he has been working at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Utrecht University, where in 1993 he was appointed as Associate Professor. His current research interests are molecular evolution and population genetics of domestic ruminants. Since 2014 he is Editor-in-Chief of the journal Animal Genetics. In 2015 he retired but continued his scientific activities. He has authored or coauthored 195 peer-reviewed publications.

Member
Nagarajan Muniyandi
Central University of Kerala
Kasaragod, India

Term of service (1st, 2023-2027, Water Buffalo)

Dr. M. Nagarajan is an Associate Professor, at Department of Genomic Science, School of Biological Science, Central University of Kerala, Kasaragod, Kerala, India. His research primarily focuses on the population genetics, functional genomics and microbiome of domestic animals. He received his M.Sc and PhD in Environmental Biotechnology from Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu, India. After his Ph.D, he carried out his postdoctoral research at Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology (CCMB), Hyderabad, India and then at Laboratoire de Biologie Moléculaire de la Cellule, Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon, France. He was an Assistant Professor at Sri Paramakalyani Centre for Environmental Sciences, Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Alwarkurichi, Tamil Nadu before joining Central University of Kerala in 2012. He is an editorial board member of Scientific Reports, BMC Genomics, PLoS One, Frontiers in Genetics, and Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution. He has more than 40 publications in leading international journals including PLoS Genetics and Molecular Ecology.

Member
Jessica Petersen
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Lincoln, NE United States

Term of service (2nd, 2021-2025, Horse)

Jessica Petersen is an Associate Professor of Animal Functional Genomics at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. She obtained her BS and MS degrees, both in biology, from Nebraska Wesleyan University and Western Illinois University, respectively. Her PhD work at the University of California-Davis focused on conservation genetics, paving the way to a post-doctoral position at the University of Minnesota where she led the first large-scale study of genetic diversity of the horse. After joining the faculty at Nebraska she has continued to work closely with colleagues across the world, beef cattle and horse breed associations, and breeders to identify variation associated with wanted, or unwanted phenotypes. In addition, a large portion of her work remains focused on understanding the genetic diversity of horse breeds with application to management.

Member
François Pompanon
Univ Grenoble Alpes
Grenoble, France

Term of service (2nd, 20123-2025, sheep)

Member
Axel Villalobos Cortes
IDIAP
PANAMA, Panama

Term of service (2nd, 2023-2025)