Jasna Kovac, Ph.D.
The Pennsylvania State University
Jasna Kovac, Ph.D., is an associate professor and Lester Earl and Veronica Casida Career Development Professor of Food Safety at The Pennsylvania State University. She earned her B.S. in microbiology and Ph.D. in biosciences with a focus on microbial biotechnology from University of Ljubljana, Slovenia. Following her doctoral work, she completed postdoctoral training at Cornell University, where her research centered on the microbial genomics of foodborne pathogens.
Since joining the Department of Food Science at Penn State in 2017, Kovac has adopted a precision food safety approach, focusing on strain-level variations in virulence, growth dynamics and resistance mechanisms in foodborne pathogens, as well as studying the impact of environmental microbiota on pathogens. Her work has been pivotal in advancing our understanding of how environmental microbiota impact the antimicrobial tolerance, survival and persistence of Listeria monocytogenes in food processing environments. Moreover, her research on the Bacillus cereus group has revisited the genomic taxonomy of this species complex, facilitating more precise predictions of virulence, antimicrobial resistance and growth potential of individual strains within the group. These contributions are especially significant for microorganisms of industrial, food safety and public health concern.
Kovac is a member of the executive committee of the Penn State One Health Microbiome Center, the inaugural chair of the department of food science’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee and the recipient of the Institute of Food Technologists’ Outstanding Young Scientist Award in Honor of Samuel Prescott (2023) and the Institut M茅rieux Young Investigator Award in Antimicrobial Resistance (2019).
Since joining the Department of Food Science at Penn State in 2017, Kovac has adopted a precision food safety approach, focusing on strain-level variations in virulence, growth dynamics and resistance mechanisms in foodborne pathogens, as well as studying the impact of environmental microbiota on pathogens. Her work has been pivotal in advancing our understanding of how environmental microbiota impact the antimicrobial tolerance, survival and persistence of Listeria monocytogenes in food processing environments. Moreover, her research on the Bacillus cereus group has revisited the genomic taxonomy of this species complex, facilitating more precise predictions of virulence, antimicrobial resistance and growth potential of individual strains within the group. These contributions are especially significant for microorganisms of industrial, food safety and public health concern.
Kovac is a member of the executive committee of the Penn State One Health Microbiome Center, the inaugural chair of the department of food science’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Committee and the recipient of the Institute of Food Technologists’ Outstanding Young Scientist Award in Honor of Samuel Prescott (2023) and the Institut M茅rieux Young Investigator Award in Antimicrobial Resistance (2019).