Rich Lamar

Dr. Rich Lamar

Senior Director of Research and Development

Education:

  • PhD, Forest Soils, North Carolina State University
  • MS, Forestry, Mississippi State University
  • BS, Biology/Chemistry, University of Miami

Work History:

  • Huma (2019),
  • Horizon Ag-Products (2013),
  • EarthFax Development Corp (1996),
  • U.S. Forestry Service (1986)

My first introduction to science was working as a technician at the Virginia Tech (VPI) Poultry Science Department in Blacksburg, Va. While working at VPI I began to take forestry courses, which led to an opportunity to work with Dr. John Hodges at Mississippi State University in Starkville, Miss., on a Master of Science degree project to investigate the effects of undercutting and mycorrhizal inoculation of hardwood seedlings in the nursery on seedling vigor and out-planting success.

This led to an interest in plant-mycorrhizal fungal associations and an opportunity to work with Dr. Chuck Davey to pursue a PhD at North Carolina State University, working on mycorrhizal applications in production of hardwood tree seedlings. After completing my doctorate in 1986, I began a two-year post-doc position at the Institute for Microbial and Biochemical Technology (IMBT) at the USDA Forest Service Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, Wisc., where I was later hired as a soil scientist to pursue the development of a soil bioremediation technology based on the pollutant-degrading abilities of white-rot wood decay fungi. The development of the technology was successful, and my group received three patents for fungal inoculum production and application of the technology. While at IMBT, I built a research group that at one point had 3 post-docs, 1 doctoral student, and 5 technical support staff, most of which were supported by outside grants.

In 1996 I became Director of R&D at a company that later became EarthFax Development Corp., with a focus on commercializing the fungal-based remediation technology. While at EarthFax Development, we started offering humic and fulvic acid analysis to the humic industry. During this time, I started interacting with the Humic Products Trade Assoc. (HPTA) to standardize the humic and fulvic acid quantitation methods.

Now at Huma, I am actively building a solid R&D/QA/QC program to support Huma humic science, product development, marketing, production, and sales.

Publications