16/08/2026
So proud to have nominated Sofie for this award
Presenting Dr Sofie Pearson, highly commended applicant for the Zonta International District 22 Woman in Climate Action award.
Dr Pearson is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Queensland working at the intersection of plant genomics and sustainable agriculture. Her research focuses on legumes and cereals as nature-based climate solutions to help farming communities cope with rising temperatures, variable rainfall and input constraints. She develops genomic tools that accelerate the breeding of climate-resilient crops, helping farming communities adapt to rising temperatures, unreliable rainfall and declining soil fertility while reducing reliance on agricultural inputs and associated emissions. Driving climate adaptation through cowpea improvement Cowpea (black-eyed pea) is a cornerstone of food and nutritional security across arid regions of sub–Saharan Africa. Cowpea thrives in low-input, drought environments. However, climate variability, heat stress and declining soil fertility threaten long-term resilience. Despite cowpea’s importance for nutrition, it remains under-resourced in global research. Within the Gates Foundation-funded “Hy Gain for Smallholders” project, she led genomic analyses that directly enable climate-ready cowpea breeding.
Her future work will focus on understanding and manipulating plant-microbe symbioses, carbon nitrogen dynamics, and environmental response pathways to create varieties better adapted to low input systems. This research aims to reduce nitrogen inputs and enhance productivity in low-input cropping systems, addressing sustainability challenges in Australian farming systems.
She is committed to ensuring that the benefits of advanced plant science reach communities most vulnerable to climate change, especially women smallholders. Her research applies modern genomic technologies to crops that have historically been under resourced. Introducing hybrid-breeding concepts into cowpea and building diversity and PAN genome resources are a significant advancement for an orphan crop.
She collaborates extensively with international research institutions, universities, national agricultural programs and community-based organizations. As an example, the Hy-Gain project brings together a multi-disciplinary team from: Australia, Germany, Japan, Mexico, Switzerland and the United States. These collaborations ensure our innovations are accessible and relevant to the communities they are designed to serve. She mentors students and early career researchers, particularly women in STEM, and co-design training materials that lift capacity and confidence across diverse research teams. This collective approach advances systemic, long-term climate resilience. Women are central to smallholder agriculture and disproportionately impacted by climate change. In many regions, women are the primary custodians of cowpea production, meaning high-performing and resilient varieties can directly enhance women’s economic resilience and food security.
