Welcome to the Cannabis

and Science Podcast. I'm your host, Tad Hussey of Kiss Organics.

This is the podcast where we discuss the cutting edge of growing from a science-based perspective

and drawn top experts from around the industry to share their wisdom and knowledge.

My guest this week is Dr. Daniela Vergara. She's an evolutionary biologist, data analyst, educator, scientific writer, and public speaker.

In addition to her multiple publications, she founded and directs a non-profit organization, the Agricultural Genomics Foundation.

AGAF aims to make hemp and cannabinoid science available to a broad public.

Dr. Vergara recently joined the Harvest

New York Extension Team from Cornell University as an emerging crop specialist to help hemp farms

with their crop. Dr. Vergara's scientific publications include the comparison of the

cannabinoids by the federally produced cannabis to that produced by the private market.

These results were featured in news platforms

such as the Atlantic, Science, and 538. Recently, she published a comparison between the genome of

these federally produced varieties to the genome of the varieties found in the private markets.

Some of her other scientific publications are a compilation of the existing genomic tools available for cannabis research that was featured in science and the maternally inherited genomes, chloropast, and microchondria.

Vergara has authored these publications along with collaborators from the private sector in the cannabis industry, as well as academics from several institutions

worldwide. Through AGF, Vergara educates the public about science, data and analysis, statistics,

evolutionary biology, and genomics. Now on to the show.

Hi, Daniela. Thanks for coming on the show today.

Hi, Kaz. Thank you for having me. Yeah, I'm excited that we're getting the opportunity to talk.

Why don't we start off by giving listeners a little bit of your background?

Perfect. So now I am in Cornell University in the cooperative extension.

...