Dennis Gonsalves

About Dennis

• After earning his bachelor’s degree in horticulture from the University of Hawaii, he originally just wanted to find a job.
• He was hired as a technician on Kauaʻi, and his boss showed him a virus he suspected was developing on the papaya plants.
• With no preparation—aside from one plant pathology class he’d taken in college—he was tasked with identifying the virus.
• He checked out books on plant pathology and spent nine months studying the virus; during that time, he got hooked.
• He decided curing this virus would become his life’s work; he went back to school to earn his Ph.D. in plant pathology.
• As he further researched the virus, it started rapidly spreading and threatening the livelihood of Hawaii’s papaya farmers.
• Eventually, he genetically engineered the "Rainbow" papaya to be resistant to this devastating papaya ringspot virus.
• Rainbow papayas now make up over 75 percent of Hawaii's papayas; he’s largely credited with saving the industry in the state.