Susan Brown is the Herman M. Cohn Professor of Agriculture and Life Sciences at Cornell University and a faculty member in the sections of Horticulture and field member in Plant Breeding and Genetics in the School of Integrative Plant Science. Susan leads the Cornell apple breeding program. The managed varieties SnapDragon™ and RubyFrost™ (2013) and open release apples NY 56 (‘Cordera’), NY 73 (‘Pink Luster’) and NY109 (‘Firecracker’) are the most recent releases.  

Susan’s research is on breeding, genetic and genomic studies and improvement of apple scion cultivars, including breeding for disease resistance in apple.   Among her awards, Susan was a named a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (2020), a fellow of The American Society of Horticultural Sciences (2019), a NY State Senate Woman of Distinction (2014) and received the American Pomological Society’s Wilder Medal (2016) for her contributions to Pomology.