Ventria Bioscience Brings Former K-State Researcher Back to Kansas
For Immediate Release
9/3/08

Junction City, KS-Ventria Bioscience (www.ventria.com) announced the hiring of Dr. Weiqiang Zhang. Dr. Zhang will manage plant breeding and nursery operations and will be based in Junction City, Kansas. Dr. Zhang will work to successfully increase protein yields and adapt plant varieties to local production areas. He will also manage Ventria’s nursery operations, which are operated under USDA regulations.

“Ventria is very pleased to hire a person of Dr. Zhang’s stature to help with our expanding plant breeding program,” said Greg Unruh, Ventria’s Vice President and General Manager of Operations.

“We believe Dr. Zhang has the aptitude, field experience and skills to be a major contributor to our entire breeding program. His extensive experience in rice breeding and genetics, agronomy, crop physiology and molecular biology will be extremely beneficial and will help to maximize Ventria’s production efficiency,” said Unruh.

Dr. Zhang was a research scientist at Kansas State University in 2000 and 2001. Since that time, Dr. Zhang received his PhD in agronomy from Louisiana State University in 2005 and has been a postdoctoral research associate in Louisiana. Dr. Zhang also earned Agronomy degrees from Shenyang Agricultural University and Hebei Agricultural University, both in China.

About Ventria Bioscience
Ventria is committed to developing affordable human health products that enhance and save lives. A child health study showed that Ventria’s initial product helped reduce the duration of diarrhea in children by 30 percent, from 5.2 days to 3.7 days. Childhood diarrhea is the second leading killer of children, claiming 2 million lives annually according to the World Health Organization. Ventria uses plants, such as rice, as a biological factory to produce protein-based products for human health and nutrition.

For more information, visit www.Ventria.com.

Erik H. Vogel
Communications Director
970-407-1239