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Carlos O. Miller Fellowship

Carlos O. Miller Fellowship

About Carlos Miller

Carlos O. Miller (1923-2012) enrolled at The Ohio State University after serving in the army during World War II. He earned his doctorate in plant physiology there in 1951, and upon graduation accepted a position in Folke Skoog’s laboratory at the University of Wisconsin. There, Miller isolated kinetin, a key hormone that influences plant growth and development. The Skoog lab was the first to show the diversity of kinetin’s effects and its interaction with the plant hormone auxin.

Carlos Miller on the IU campus in the fall 2003. — Carlos Miller on the IU Bloomington campus in fall 2003. Photo by Ashley Rider Mattingly

Miller joined the IU faculty in 1957. The majority of his work revolved around cytokinin-related substances. In the early 1960s, Miller extracted zeatin from maize endosperm, showing the first instance of a naturally occurring adenine-based cytokinin. He retired from teaching in 1987, but continued his research up until his death in 2012. His last project focused on an herb, Lindenbergia muraria. Miller had discovered a compound that promoted flowering and was investigating how environmental factors interact with that compound.

In 1999, Carlos established the Carlos O. Miller Chair of Plant Growth and Development to help strengthen IU’s efforts to build a group with research emphasis on the biochemistry of plant growth and development. Miller felt the field would assume an increasing importance in agriculture as the world human population increased. He endowed and established the Carlos O. Miller Graduate Fellowship in Plant Developmental Biology in 2007.

2025 Miller Fellow: Riley Rees

Riley is a Ph.D. student in the Nikolov Lab studying the evolution of floral nectaries, or the structures on flowers that produce nectar. With the support of the Miller Fellowship, they will continue their research on how the mechanisms that develop nectaries differ across plant families. Outside of the lab, Riley enjoys helping out at a local community garden and learning more about sustainable food systems.

Riley sitting at a microscope with a preserved plant specimen. Photo credit: Leonie Moyle.

2025 Miller Fellow: Zoe Hert

Zoe is a Ph.D. student in the Moyle Lab, broadly interested in the genomics of diversification. For her dissertation, she is investigating the mechanisms and history of fruit color evolution in nightshades (Solanum), with a particular focus on wild Galápagos tomatoes. She uses population genomics and phylogenetic comparative methods to examine this trait evolution across multiple scales. In addition, Zoe enjoys teaching and mentoring student researchers. She says it’s so exciting to see students build their computational skillset and then apply these skills to address biological questions.

Zoe sees a wild tomato, Solanum galapagense, while doing fieldwork on the Galápagos! Photo credit: Leonie Moyle.

2025 Miller Fellow: Rory King

Rory is a Ph.D. candidate in the GCDB program and a member of Dr. Sidney Shaw's lab. His overarching interests lie in understanding the mechanisms by which plants regulate their growth and development to adapt to changes in their environment. Currently, he is using the gene WDL4 to study the genetic mechanisms that underlie plant growth responses to elevated temperature. After completing his Ph.D., he hopes to remain in academia in order to continue his research as well as train future generations of plant scientists.

Rory hiking in the Ring of Gullion in Northern Ireland.

2025 Miller Fellow: Michael Kwakye

Michael is a second-year Ph.D. student in Dr. Luke Nikolov's lab. The lab studies flower development, with special focus given to the nectary. This award will fund his work for the upcoming academic year as Michael continues his thesis project, which aims to untangle how the genes required for nectar production in Arabidopsis thaliana are regulated.

2025 Miller Fellow: Timothy Cioffi

Timothy is a Ph.D. student in Sidney Shaw's Lab where he studies the organization of cortical microtubules in plant cells. He enjoys performing and presenting his research and spending time with his fiancée and two children. He will use this fellowship to focus on the completion of his thesis project. Timothy plans to search for post-doctoral positions following graduation to continue investigating how plants grow and develop at the molecular level.

Timothy and his son, Calvin, checking on plants in the lab.

2025 Miller Fellow: Madison McReynolds

Madison is a second-year Ph.D. student in the Shaw lab studying plant cortical microtubule array organization. Outside of lab, she's looking forward to continuing her work with the grad worker’s coalition, gardening, and caring for her pets (one cat, two geckos, fish, and shrimp).

Department of Biology

Carlos O. Miller Fellowship