Dr. Cheng received his Ph.D in 1991 and MS in 1988 from Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, and his B.S. degree in 1982 from Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, China. After his graduation from Cornell, he worked as an Assistant and Associate Professor at North Dakota State University from November 1990 to August 2001, and as the Director of the Cellular & Molecular Biology Ph.D Program (10/1998 -- 8/2001). Dr. Cheng joined the University of Tennessee in August 2001 as an Associate professor, and now is a Full Professor. Dr. Cheng's research program focuses on three major areas: 1) Populus genomics and functional genomics as a part of the DOE’s Bioenergy Science Center (BESC) program. 2) Biotechnology of horticultural crops, and 3) Grapevine genomics and functional genomics. As of 2009, Dr. Cheng has authored and coauthored 56 refereed publications, eight book chapters, guest-edited (with Dr. G.A.Tuskan) a special issue of Critical Review in Plant Sciences, a book review, 6 extension publications. Dr. Cheng owns or jointly-owns three Plant Variety patents and two disclosures. Over the years, Dr. Cheng’s research has been funded by USDA-NRI, DOE, CPBR/DOE/EPA, NPS, USDA-FS, USDA-SCS, and various biotech and nursery companies. Dr. Cheng is currently an Associate Editor for Plant Cell Tissue organ Culture, Reviews Editor for Plant Cell Tissue organ Culture, Associate Editor for Acta Agricultural Biotechnology. Dr. Cheng regularly reviews proposals for NSF, USDA, and manuscripts for various professional journals. Dr. Cheng also serves to the profession, university and community in various capacities. In very limited spare time, Dr. Cheng enjoys diverse activities, including reading, travel, exercise, real estate investment, personal finance and immigration advising, volunteering in local communities, and philanthropy. Max Cheng, has been called “Cheng” at Cornell in Ithaca, NY, “Zong-Ming’ at NDSU in Fargo, ND, and “Max” at UT in Knoxville. “Max”, not Maxwell, rather “Maximum”.