Ralph Lange

Professional Bio

M.Sc. in Plant Pathology and Plant Breeding | University of Alberta 
B.Sc. in Agriculture | University of Alberta 

 For the last 33 years, Ralph has been a professional with expertise in the evaluation of products, genetics, technologies, or basically anything that impacts crop plants, fungi grown as crops, or pathogenic microbes that affect our field and horticultural crops. He has been working in this capacity at InnoTech and its predecessor organizations for 26 years, but before that filled similar roles for other private and public organizations.  Ralph is a Canadian Seed Growers Association-certified plant breeder. Some of the exciting activities Ralph has led include:

• Performance evaluation of field and greenhouse crop production products and technologies, including products and equipment for cannabis production 
• Data analytics 
• Cultivation of fungi 
• Genetic characterization of fungi including mushrooms and fungal pathogens 
• Identification and control of fungal and bacterial pathogens of field and horticultural crops
• Elucidation is the genetics of virulence in fungal pathogens, and resistance to those pathogens in plants

Over the last several years, Ralph has gained new expertise in evaluation of microbiological loads of industrial surfaces, cannabis, and hemp, and the use of bacteriophages as surrogates for biosafety level 3 pathogens such as SARS-CoV-2.  

When he’s not working on plants and microbes, Ralph is a fiddler and double-bassist active in the traditional music scene.