Publications

Understanding the material behavior of maize stalks is important in understanding stalk lodging. Our lab recently measured the last set of influential material constants required to fully define stalk tissue behavior: the longitudinal shear modulus. Shear modulus was measured through repeated random sampled torsion testing. These results were published in the journal Plant Methods.
Joseph Carter, Joshua Hoffman, Braxton Fjeldsted, Grant Ogilvie, and Douglas Cook

A new model of the maize stalk that provides total, independent control over 51 geometric features. This will enable future sensitivity and optimization studies.
Michael Ottesen, Joseph Carter, Ryan Hall, Nan-Wei Liu, Douglas Cook

We quantify the influence of water content on the longitudinal modulus of elasticity of rind and pith tissues.
Brandon Sutherland, Kirsten Steele, Douglas Cook

It would seem easy to use multiple tests to solve for the axial variation of flexural stiffness along the length of a stem. As it turns out this approach is highly sensitive to measurement error!
Nelson N, Sutherland B, Yancey M, Liao CS Stubbs C, and Cook DD

Contrary to common perceptions, stalk chemistry has little influence on stalk strength. But morphology (architecture) has a major influence.
Robertson DJ, Brenton ZW, Kresovich S, and Cook DD

The leaf sheath has a major influence on maize stalk flexibility that changes over time. A multivariate nonlinear statistical approach based on sigmoid curves was used to capture this effect.
J Hale, S Webb, N Hale, C Stubbs, DD Cook (2022)