Byrne researches the application of quantitative and molecular genetics to crop improvement and biotechnology risk assessment.

Byrne is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Society of Agronomy, and the Crop Science Society of America, and was the 2002 recipient of the College of Agriculture’s Charles N. Shepardson Teaching Award.

Byrne received his B.A. in Biology from Washington University, St. Louis in 1970. He then studied at the University of Missouri, Columbia, earning his M.S. in Horticulture in 1978 and his Ph.D. in Agronomy in 1987.