Nikee Shrestha

Nikee Shrestha is a Ph.D. student with a strong passion for genetics and genomics. Her research focuses on integrating classical population genetics, comparative genomics, and modern AI tools to uncover gene functions and advance our understanding of complex biological systems.

In the News

December 03, 2025 Three students receive IANR fellowships
Three students in our lab were honored as UNL graduate fellowship recipients. Congratulations to Jensina Davis (Hardin Fellow), Nikee Shrestha, and Sofiya Arora (Widaman Fellows).
July 01, 2025 Plants People Planet cover feature
Michael Tross and a paper led by Nikee Shrestha are featured on the cover of Plants, People, Planet. Read the cover write-up, which links to the paper.
January 20, 2025 Satellite phenotyping spotlight
Nikee Shrestha’s USDA NIFA-supported project on satellite-based corn phenotyping was featured in Plant People Planet.
August 22, 2024 Nikee Shrestha passes candidacy exam
Nikee Shrestha advanced to candidacy in the PhD program.
January 22, 2024 Plant and Animal Genome 2024
Vladimir Torres, Nikee Shrestha, and Jensina Davis were each invited to present at PAG 2024 in San Diego. Great job!

Recent Publications

Shrestha N, Ji Zhongjie, Dai X, Li P, Schnable JC (2025) A sequence-based classifier distinguishes phenotype-associated genes from other gene models in plants bioRxiv doi: 10.64898/2025.11.30.691407 Preprint
Powadi A, Jubery T, Tross M, Shrestha N, Coffey L, Schnable JC, Schnable PS, Ganapathysubramanian B (2025) Enhancing yield prediction from plot-level satellite imagery through genotype and environment feature disentanglement. Frontiers in Plant Science doi: 10.3389/fpls.2025.1617831
Davis JM, Gaillard M, Tross MC, Shrestha N, Ostermann I, Grove RJ, Li B, Benes B, Schnable JC (2025) 3D reconstruction enables high-throughput phenotyping and quantitative genetic analysis of phyllotaxy. Plant Phenomics doi: 10.1016/j.plaphe.2025.100023 bioRxiv doi: 10.1101/2024.10.03.616344
Mathivanan RK, Pedersen C, Turkus J, Shrestha N, Ali W, Torres-Rodriguez JV, Mural RV, Obata T, Schnable JC (2025) Transcripts and genomic intervals associated with variation in metabolite abundance in maize leaves under field conditions. BMC Genomics doi: 10.1186/s12864-025-11580-3 bioRxiv doi: 10.1101/2024.08.26.609532
Shrestha N, Powadi A, Davis J, Ayanlade TT, Liu H, Tross MC, Mathivanan RK, Bares J, Lopez-Corona L, Turkus J, Coffey L, Tubery TZ, Ge Y, Sarkar S, Schnable JC, Ganapathysubramanian B, Schnable PS (2025) Plot-level satellite imagery can substitute for UAVs in assessing maize phenotypes across multistate field trials. Plants Planet People doi: 10.1002/ppp3.10613 agriRxiv doi: 10.31220/agriRxiv.2024.00251
Mangal H, Linders K, Turkus J, Shrestha N, Long B, Kuang X, Cebert E, Torres-Rodriguez JV, Schnable JC (2025) Genes and pathways determining flowering time variation in temperate adapted sorghum. The Plant Journal doi: 10.1111/tpj.70250 bioRxiv doi: 10.1101/2024.12.12.628249
Ali W, Grzybowski M, Torres-Rodriguez JV, Li F, Shrestha N, Mathivanan RK, de Bernardeaux G, Hoang K, Mural R, Roston RL, Schnable JC, Sahay S (2025) Quantitative genetics of photosynthetic trait variation in maize. Journal of Experimental Botany doi: 10.1093/jxb/eraf198 bioRxiv doi: 10.1101/2024.11.25.625283
Shrestha N, Mangal H, Torres-Rodriguez JV, Tross MC, Lopez-Corona L, Linders K, Sun G, Mural RV, Schnable JC (2025) Off-the-shelf image analysis models outperform human visual assessment in identifying genes controlling seed color variation in sorghum. The Plant Phenome Journal doi: 10.1002/ppj2.70013 bioRxiv doi: 10.1101/2024.07.22.604683
Ostermann I, Benes B, Gaillard M, Li B, Davis J, Grove RJ, Shrestha N, Tross MC, Schnable JC (2024) Sorghum segmentation and leaf counting using an in silico trained deep neural model. The Plant Phenome Journal doi: 10.1002/ppj2.70002
Sahay S, Shrestha N, Moura Dias H, Mural RV, Grzybowski M, Schnable JC, Glowacka K (2024) Nonphotochemical quenching kinetics GWAS in sorghum identifies genes that may play conserved roles in maize and Arabidopsis thaliana photoprotection. The Plant Journal doi: 10.1111/tpj.16967 bioRxiv doi: 10.1101/2023.08.29.555201