Justin Pahara is a research scientist and project lead in nanotechnology (biotic stresses and adaptation) at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) in Lethbridge. He earned an undergraduate degree in immunology and infection and a master’s in cell biology (cancer research) at the University of Alberta before completing a PhD in chemical engineering and biotechnology at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom.

Pahara lives on one of the longest-running family farms in Lethbridge County, established in 1918.

Where did you work before AAFC?

Before AAFC, I was in commercial entrepreneurship at Amino Labs, an educational biotechnology company that creates kits and tools for high school teachers and home learners to learn about genetic engineering and biotechnology. I created the main core technology for the company.

What got you interested in this area of work?

When I was young, I wanted to be a doctor, but during undergrad I became more interested in how medicines were created and who created them rather than prescribing them. That led me more toward research.

I was drawn to a gap within the space: most labs focus on developing RNA, but few focus on how to reliably deliver it to targets. I already had a background in nanotechnology from my chemical engineering studies, and the bigger question became how to apply it to agriculture. This felt like an area where I could make an impact.

Tell us a bit about what you’re working on at AAFC.

We focus on molecular delivery, engineering nanostructures about 10,000 times smaller than a human hair to go into different organisms. A current project funded in part by Manitoba Crop Alliance is “Screening RNA penetration to achieve gene knockdown in plants for the development of Smart Crop Technologies.”

Most crop treatments today are broad-spectrum, like insecticides or herbicides, and can impact a lot of different organisms and plants in our ecosystem beyond the target. As part of our program, we are working on building highly targeted crop treatments that only target what we want.

That is where RNA interference comes in. Plants and cells have mini-immune systems that chop up harmful RNA, from a virus for example, to prevent it from replicating. By sending in smaller pieces of RNA with the nanostructures we’re developing, we can tell plants to knock down or lower the expression of specific genes.

The challenge is delivery. Our focus is getting these nanostructures into plants, insects and fungi so they could be used by farmers. We’re looking at crop treatments like seed coatings or sprays that could work in the field.

This project began in April 2025, building on past research and learnings within our programs. We are targeting two genes to show proof of principle within this project. One is green fluorescent protein from jellyfish in engineered plants, which glows green under UV light. The other is EPSPS, the enzyme targeted by glyphosate (Roundup). Kochia, a widespread weed across the Prairies, is becoming very resistant to glyphosate. By studying it, we’re hoping to find new approaches for controlling this highly resistant weed.

What can you say about the value of farmers providing funding and support to your organization?

It’s important because farmers decide what matters most to them, and most of our research is externally funded by farmers. Our lab is engineering technology focused, and we want to build things that are useful to farmers.

Funding from producer groups is a step towards creating something useful, rather than “pie in the sky” research that may only be useful decades later. Our goal is to de-risk these sophisticated technologies so the industry can carry them forward. Ideally, we enable small and medium-sized enterprises in Canada to develop these technologies since they often lack the capacity or resources of multinational companies.

Without farmers, this research wouldn’t happen and we’d have to rely on multinational companies, who may or may not pursue these types of solutions.

How does that farmer funding and support directly benefit farmers?

Although the benefits aren’t immediate, we hope by the end of the decade to start getting some next-generation crop treatments out the door. We focus on crop treatments that farmers need, while navigating regulatory aspects, since nanotechnology and RNA applications are very new.

One of the cool things about RNA is that it can be tweaked like code. There’s a very high likelihood that we’ll be able to invent a system with RNA and the nanoparticle that goes into a target, and if that target develops resistance, we can adjust the code slightly and the overall product stays effectively the same. Regulators currently treat each change as a new or different formulation, so part of our work is learning more about regulation and opening dialogue to help pave the way for more efficient adoption.

I’m also open to hearing from farmers about their challenges. Feel free to email me at justin.pahara@agr.gc.ca. This helps us make our nano formulations more practical. For example, we’ve built specialized spray chambers that allow us to safely spray these nano formulations, and we used industrial nozzles like a farmer would. This allows us to develop treatments in a realistic context early on, rather than finding out later that something won’t work in the field.

How do you spend your time outside of work?

We do a lot of gardening and grow a lot of food we eat. I’m into clean energy, we have solar systems and I’m also writing a sci-fi novel for fun.

What’s the best part about your job?

Exploring the unknown. Our lab builds things that don’t exist. We don’t know how they’ll work or how to get there, which makes the little wins exciting. A big part of that is working with a great team.

Follow @jpahara on X (formerly Twitter).

George diCenzo is an associate professor in the Department of Biology and cross-appointed to the Department of Chemical Engineering at Queen’s University. He also holds an adjunct professor position at the University of Manitoba (UM) in the Department of Microbiology.

diCenzo completed his undergraduate and PhD studies at McMaster University in Hamilton, ON, before moving to Italy for his postdoc at the University of Florence.

He lives in Kingston, ON, with his partner, Rebecca Doyle, who’s also a professor that studies rhizobia and rhizobial inoculants for agriculture.

Where did you work before Queen’s University?

Before joining Queen’s as an assistant professor, I was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Florence in Italy.

What got you interested in this area of work?

It was partly by chance. I was always interested in biology, sciences and research. At one point, I thought I’d be more involved in medically related research. In my second year of undergrad, I was trying to get into a lab to do research in the summer and got one offer for a spot that following summer, Turlough Finan’s Lab, which studied rhizobia. It was more fundamental research, but it was with this agriculturally important bacterium. I took that position, worked in the lab that summer and I really loved working there and all the research we were doing.

I went back the summer after my third year, stayed for a fourth-year thesis and did my PhD thesis all in that same lab. So, in a way, I got into the broader area of working with rhizobia by chance; it was the one lab that gave me a spot when I first applied, and I really enjoyed it.

Tell us a bit about what you’re working on at Queen’s and the UM.

There are three main aspects of my research. One is fundamental work with rhizobia, nitrogen-fixing bacteria that interact with legume plants. We study their genomics, metabolism and diversity to build new knowledge that can support agriculture.

Another area is plastic biodegradation, which is separate from our agriculture work. We’re looking for microbes and enzymes that can break down different plastics for recycling. That’s where my cross appointment to the Department of Chemical Engineering comes in.

And then there’s my applied research in microbial agriculture, where we’re looking for bio-inoculants for different types of crops. Some of that is rhizobia for legumes like beans, some involves other potential microbes that might benefit non-legume crops. That’s the focus of the “Bio-inoculants for the promotion of nutrient use efficiency and crop resiliency in Canadian agriculture” (BENEFIT) project, which I co-lead with Ivan Oresnik at the UM.

The BENEFIT project is funded through Genome Canada by the governments of Ontario and Manitoba, and various grower groups including Manitoba Crop Alliance. It brings together 16 professors across six universities. Broadly speaking, the goal is to try and reduce reliance on chemical fertilizers, or supplement their use, with microbial products, like bacteria and fungi. These microbes can help plants fix nitrogen, solubilize phosphorus, take up nutrients from the environment and some can even have effects on pests, diseases or stresses like cold temperatures.

Microbial inoculants already work well for legumes like soybeans, peas and lentils, where they form a specific interaction with the rhizobia to provide nitrogen to the plants. For crops like wheat and barley that can’t form this interaction with rhizobia, microbial products have historically been less effective. As part of this project, we’re tackling some of those challenges with hopes to develop new microbial products that are more reliable for growers.

To do this, we’ve generated a library of over 2,000 microbes isolated from Canadian soils. The idea is that microbes from Canadian soils are already adapted to our conditions and are more likely to succeed in Canadian fields. We’re now working on characterizing these microbes, looking at how well they’re able to promote plant growth, starting with lab trials and eventually moving to field trials.

We’re also looking at the economics and environmental impact, asking “what level of performance would make these bio-inoculants valuable for growers and for the industry to produce?” The main crops we’re focused on are wheat, barley, canola, beans and peas, with a smaller part on kale. The project is still in its early years. We only have preliminary results at this point; however, we are seeing some promising results for beans that I’m excited about.

What can you say about the value of farmers providing funding and support to your organization?

It’s essential. We don’t get core funding from the universities, so all of our research relies on funding from external sources. Support from farmers allows us to hire people and cover costs associated with doing the work.

Farmer funding is also critical because many government programs require matching dollars from industry. For example, with the Genome Canada grant every dollar from farmers helps us unlock another dollar from government. That leverage means their contributions go even further.

How does that farmer funding and support directly benefit farmers?

Our goal is always to make results public, so farmers or companies can use them to create products that directly benefit farms. If we find a new microbial product, for example, the goal would be to make it commercially available so farmers can access it.

That said, research is never guaranteed. We’re doing everything we can to develop bio-inoculants that can potentially help farmers, but sometimes science doesn’t deliver the results we hope for. It’s important to not overpromise, but with continued support, we’re optimistic that in a few years we’ll have exciting updates to share.

How do you spend your time outside of work?

I like going for hikes with my dog, and I also like watching the Toronto Maple Leafs continue to get eliminated from the playoffs. I still cheer for them every year, regardless.

What is the best part about your job?

There’s lots I like about my job, but if I must pick one, it’s the discovery aspect. With research, we’re always asking questions and trying to find answers to those questions with experiments. I find it a lot of fun when we get results from new experiments, and sometimes answers to those questions, and we’re the first people in the world to know what that is. It’s a lot of fun to be able to do that and spend the time thinking about these things.

What is your favourite food or meal to cook?

Homemade pizza. I have a pizza stone for my barbecue, and making a nice Italian-style pizza on it is the best.

Follow @George_diCenzo on X or connect with him on LinkedIn.