Dr. Roland F. Line, Research Plant Pathologist with the USDA-ARS Wheat Genetics Unit at Pullman, retired 31 December, 1999, after 36 years of federal service. He was an adjunct professor in the Department of Plant Pathology at Washington State University.

Dr. Line was born in Winona, Minnesota. He received a B.S. degree in agricultural education in 1956 and his M.S. (1959) and Ph.D. (1962) degrees in plant pathology and genetics from the University of Minnesota. He has worked on cereal diseases for more than 40 years. As a research associate at the University of Minnesota (1959-63), he was responsible for research on the ecological potential and survival of stem rust. From 1962 to 1968, Dr. Line led a coöperative U.S. Army, USDA, and experiment station project on stem rust epidemiology and loss assessment at central U.S. sites from Oklahoma to North Dakota. In 1968, Dr. Line assumed leadership of the USDA-ARS research program on control of rusts and smuts at Washington State University, Pullman, WA. Dr. Line implemented a control program that reduced flag smut to a minor disease and saved farmers millions of dollars. He developed a rust monitoring program that provided early warning to breeders and growers to enable them to take action to prevent major losses. He has developed computerized expert systems for predicting and managing wheat and barley diseases (MoreCrop for wheat and MoreCrop for barley) that are available on the Internet (http://pnw-ag.wsu.edu/morecrop/) and are used by both growers and scientists. His concept of computerized expert systems for managing plant diseases has been nationally and internationally recognized and adopted. Dr. Line identified with coworkers more than 60 wheat stripe rust races and more than 40 barley stripe rust races and used virulence data and molecular techniques to develop concepts on the evolution, origin, distribution, and relationships among stripe rust forms and races. His rust research program resulted in the identification of several unique types of stripe rust resistance, the most important being durable, high-temperature, adult-plant resistance. Dr. Line has contributed to the release of over 50 wheat cultivars with rust resistance, which has prevented multimillion dollar losses to the wheat industry. Dr. Line and coworkers have identified more than 40 wheat genes and 30 barley genes for stripe rust resistance, determined the chromosomal location of many of the genes, and recently identified molecular markers to aid in breeding for resistance.

Dr. Line is an international authority on cereal rusts and smuts, expert systems, disease forecasting, crop loss assessment, chemical control, genetics, breeding for resistance, integrated disease management, and cereal diseases in general. Dr. Line has published more than 350 technical publications, papers, and book chapters. Committee service includes the National Wheat Improvement, Wheat Crop Advisory/Germplasm, Western Wheat Workers, Cereal Disease, and numerous American Phytopathological Society committees. He was a member of the USDA­TCK Team that provided the biological justification for removing the Chinese import barrier to Pacific Northwest wheat. In recognition of his contributions to wheat and barley research, he has received the O.A. Vogel Crop Improvement Award, USDA Certificates of Merit, and was recognized in 1999 as a fellow of the American Phytopathological Society. For the immediate future, he will remain at Pullman, WA, where he has an office in the Department of Plant Pathology at Washington State University.