Sushan Ru

Sushan Ru

  • Assistant Professor
  • Small Fruit Breeder
  • Department of Horticulture
334-844-3094
szr0099@auburn.edu
AG-STEM Building Room 1362
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AU Small Fruit Breeding

Dr. Sushan Ru joined Auburn University in 2021 to establish Alabama’s first small fruit breeding program. Her research is driven by a passion for developing improved blueberry cultivars with enhanced stress tolerance, fruit quality, and adaptation to the growing challenges faced by producers in the southeastern United States. She is equally committed to advancing scientific discovery through interdisciplinary approaches that integrate genetics, genomics, data science, and crop improvement, while fostering the next generation of scientists through teaching and mentorship.

Prior to joining Auburn, Dr. Ru earned her Ph.D. at Washington State University, where she focused on marker-assisted breeding in tree fruit crops. She subsequently completed postdoctoral training at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and University of Minnesota, investigating strategies to optimize genotyping accuracy in autopolyploid species and accelerate genetic gain through targeted recombination.

Education

  • Ph.DHorticulture, Washington State University2011-2016

  • M.S.Horticulture, Washington State University2009-2011

  • B.S.Horticulture, Southwest University, China2005-2009

Professional Experience

  • Assistant Professor, Auburn University 2021–present
  • Postdoctoral Research Associate, University of Minnesota 2017–2021
  • Postdoctoral Research Associate, University of Wisconsin-Madison 2017–2018

Research

Delicious, nutritious berries are the inspiration behind my research. I am proud to lead the first small fruit breeding program at Auburn University, with the goal of developing superior blueberry cultivars for Alabama and the southeastern United States. My breeding program focuses on improving southern highbush blueberries for enhanced spring frost tolerance, disease resistance, and fruit quality, while advancing rabbiteye blueberries for earlier ripening, improved fruit quality, and greater disease resistance.

Beyond cultivar development, my research aims to increase the efficiency and sustainability of blueberry production and breeding through high-throughput phenotyping, genomic tools, and data-driven approaches. I am particularly interested in dissecting the genetic architecture of complex traits, including disease resistance and abiotic stress tolerance, using interdisciplinary methods that integrate breeding, genomics, bioinformatics, and artificial intelligence.

My lab welcomes passionate, creative, and highly motivated students and postdoctoral researchers. We are especially interested in individuals with strong programming, quantitative, and data analysis skills who are eager to apply innovative technologies to crop improvement.

COURSES

  • Plant Breeding for Specialty Crops (HORT 5100/6100, 3 credit hrs.), offered in fall semesters of even-numbered years.
  • Plant Biotechnology (HORT 7070, 3 credit hrs.), offered in fall semesters of odd-numbered years.
  • Experimental Methods (HORT 7010, 3 credit hrs.), offered every summer.

Selected Publications

1. Miao, Yanxiu; Thompson, Lily; Mendez Urbano, Freddy; Altland, James; Gao, Y. Gary; Owen, W. Garrett; Mercer, Kristin; Wu, Xingbo; Ru, Sushan; Ma, Yu (2026). Heat stress affects plant morphology, leaf color and photosynthetic characteristics in Pelargonium. HortScience 61(2):360-366. https://doi.org/10.21273/HORTSCI19144-25. Impact factor: 1.9.

2. Humann, Jodi; Jung, Sook; Cheng, Chun-Huai; Lee, Taein; Buble, Katheryn; Zheng, Ping; Ru, Sushan; Iorizzo, Massimo; Main, Dorrie (2026). Genome Database for Vaccinium: A knowledgebase for genetics, genomics, and breeding research. GENETICS: iyaf272. https://doi.org/10.1093/genetics/iyaf272. Impact factor: 5.1.

3. Vishnu Ramasubramanian, Cleiton A. Wartha, Lovepreet Singh, Paolo Vitale, Sushan Ru; Aaron J. Lorenz (2025). GS4PB: An R Shiny Application to Facilitate a Genomic Selection Pipeline for Plant Breeding. The Plant Genome 18(4), e70150. doi.org/10.1002/tpg2.70150. Impact factor: 3.8.

4. *Puranjit Singh, Nariman Niknejad, James D Spiers, Yin Bao, Sushan Ru (2025) Development of a Smartphone Application for Blueberry Detection Towards Rapid Yield Estimation. Smart Agricultural Technology 101361. doi.org/10.1016/j.atech.2025.101361. Impact factor: 5.7.

5. *Abdolshahi, Roohollah; Hardner, Craig; Main, Dorrie; Jung, Sook; Chu, Ye; Ru, Sushan (2025). Pedigree analysis of rabbiteye blueberry indicates limited genetic diversity. HortScience 60(8), 1260-1267. www.doi.org/10.21273/HORTSCI18637-25. Impact factor: 1.9.

6. *Bushakra, Jill; Jung, Sook; Su, Meng; Ru, Sushan; Main, Dorrie; Humann, Jodi L.; Bassil, Nahla V. (2025) A strawberry (Fragaria L.) crop ontology to enable standardized phenotyping for strawberry breeding and research. HortScience 60(5):784-793. https://doi.org/10.21273/HORTSCI18420-24. Impact factor: 1.9.

7. *Li, Xingjian; Ru, Sushan; He, Zixuan; Spiers, James D; Xiang, Lirong (2025) High-throughput phenotyping tolls for blueberry count, weight, and size estimation based on modified YOLOv5s. Fruit Research 5:e012. 10.48130/frures-0025-0006. Impact factor: 2.7.

8. *Rahman, Md Hasibur; Busby, Savannah; Hanif, Sajid; Maruf, Md Mesbahul, Ru, Sushan; Sanz-Saez, Alvaro; Zheng, Jingyi; Rehman, Tanzeel U (2025). A Graph Convolutional Network Approach for Hyperspectral Image Analysis of Blueberries Physiological Traits Under Drought Stress. Smart Agricultural Technology, 100743. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atech.2024.100743. Impact factor: 5.7.

9. *Amodu, Ayodele; Oliver, Jonathan E; Lawrence, Kathy; Patel, Sejal; Koebernick, Jenny; Patel, Jinesh; Coneva, Elina; Ru, Sushan (2025). Identifying the distribution and causal pathogens of blueberry stem blight in Alabama. Plant Disease, 0 0:ja. doi.org/10.1094/PDIS-07-24-1404-SR. Impact factor: 4.8.

10. *Rahman, Md Hasbur; Busby, Savannah; Ru, Sushan; Hanif, Sajid; Sanz-Saez, Alvaro; Zheng, Jingyi; Rehman, Tanzeel (2025) Transformer-based hyperspectral image analysis for phenotyping drought tolerance in blueberries. Computers and Electronics in Agriculture, 228:109684. doi.org/10.1016/j.compag.2024.109684. Impact factor: 8.9.

11. *Ru, Sushan; Sanz-Saez, Alvaro; Leisner, Courtney; Rehman, Tanzeel; Busby, Savannah (2024) Review on blueberry drought tolerance from the perspective of crop improvement. Frontiers in Plant Science 15:1352768. doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2024.1352768. Impact factor: 4.8.

12. *Ru, Sushan; Ding, Shunping; Oliver, Jonathan E.; Amondu, Ayodele (2023) A review of Botryosphaeria stem blight disease of blueberry from the perspective of plant breeding. Agriculture, 13(1), 100.  https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture13010100. Impact factor in 2022: 3.6

13. Barth, Eneide; de Resende, Juliano Tadeu; Mariguele, Keny Henrique; de Resende, Marcos Deon Vilela; da Silva, Andre Luiz Biscaia Ribeiro; Ru, Sushan (2022) Multivariate analysis methods to improve the selection of strawberry genotypes with low cold requirement. Sci Rep 12, 11458. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-15688-4. Impact factor in 2022: 4.6

14. James, Tymon; Johnson, Alexandra; Schaller, Alexander; Vanderzande, Stijin; Luo, Feixiong; Sandefur, Paul; Ru, Sushan; Peace, Cameron (2022) As it stands: the Palouse Wild Cider Apple Breeding Program. Plants, 11, 517. https://doi.org/10.3390/plants11040517. Impact factor in 2022: 4.5

15. Jung, Sook; Lee, Taein; Gasic, Ksenija; Campbell, B Todd; Yu, Jing; Humann, Jodi; Ru, Sushan; Edge-Garza, Daniel; Hough, Heidi; Main, Dorrie (2021) The Breeding Information Management System (BIMS): An online resource for crop breeding. Database, 2021, baab054. https://doi.org/10.1093/database/baab054. Impact factor in 2021: 4.5