Daren Brown is a molecular biologist and chemist. He received his BSc (1988) from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and his PhD (1993) from Albany Medical College. He conducted postdoctoral research at Texas A&M University supported by a USDA Fellowship and was a Staff Scientist at TerraGen Discovery in Vancouver, British Columbia. He joined the Mycotoxin Prevention and Applied Microbiology Research Team at the National Center for Agricultural Utilization Research in Peoria, IL in 2000. The Brown lab is primarily interested in reducing the negative impact Fusarium secondary metabolites have on our food supply. Fusarium is a very diverse fungal genus that can cause disease on virtually all crop plants. Fusarium verticillioides is among the most agriculturally important species of Fusarium because it occurs worldwide on corn and contaminate grains with fumonisins. The risk fungal toxins pose to both human and animal health is a critical concern to food/feed producers and regulatory agencies. Brown’s research is focused on identifying the molecular genetic processes required for Fusarium toxin synthesis. To address this challenge, he is pursuing multiple lines of research including improving Fusarium genomic resources for assessing mycotoxin production potential and identifying specific Fusarium genes required for toxin synthesis.