Vara Prasad recognized as one of the world's most influential researchers
Vara Prasad, university distinguished professor and R.O. Kruse Professor of Agriculture in Department of Agronomy in the College of Agriculture, has been named to Clarivate’s 2025 list of Highly Cited Researchers. The designation recognizes scholars whose published work has demonstrated significant global influence within their fields.
To earn a place on the list, researchers must have authored multiple papers that rank in the top 1% by citations in the Web of Science Core Collection. Prasad is the only researcher with K-State as a primary affiliation to be recognized in 2025.
He has been named a Highly Cited Researcher every year since 2022, marking his fourth consecutive selection.
“This remarkable achievement highlights Dr. Prasad’s leadership in advancing K-State’s research mission and shaping our future as a next-gen land-grant university,” said Hans Coetzee, vice president for research.
His research focuses on how crops respond to environmental conditions and on developing management strategies to improve and protect yields. His research, teaching and outreach activities span many countries, and he is committed to building human and institutional capacity worldwide. He has trained and mentored more than 220 scholars from 15 countries.
Prasad has published 560 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters, which have been cited more than 41,000 times. His work holds an h-index of 104 and an i-10 index of 362. Research projects involving Prasad have received more than $200 million in grant and donation funding, including nearly $150 million for projects in which he served as principal investigator.
An active leader in his field, Prasad is an elected fellow of the American Society of Agronomy, the Crop Science Society of America and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He also represents K-State on the board of the Council of Agricultural Science and Technology.
“It is an honor for K-State to be represented on this list, and it is great to have a colleague like Dr. Prasad in our department who consistently achieves milestones like this,” said Dorivar Ruiz Diaz, professor and interim department head of agronomy.
— Submitted by Jenalee Converse