Cristóbal Uauy, Women in Triticum Mentor Award winner, from the UK, is a Group Leader in wheat genetics and genomics at the John Innes Centre. His programme focuses on using genetics and genomics to improve both yield and quality components in wheat. His lab uses molecular genetic approaches to identify genes involved in wheat productivity traits and enhance the translation of this knowledge into improved varieties for farmers, industry and consumers. His lab also develops open-access tools and resources to enhance scientific discovery, such as www.wheat-training.com, www.wheat-expression.com and www.crop-haplotypes.com. He is passionate about training the next generation of crop scientists on both scientific and soft skills. Together with Brande Wulff, and postdocs and students from their labs, he has trained over one hundred participants, from 27 countries, in a series of Scientific Soft Skills workshops in Kenya, India, Morocco, Egypt and the UK. His lab works closely with partners in India, Ethiopia, Kenya, Brazil, Chile and CIMMYT among others. Cristobal’s work has been recognized as the most outstanding PhD dissertation in Biological and Life Sciences in the US and Canada (2007), the Bayer Foundation Early Excellence in Science Award (2012), the Society of Experimental Biology President’s Medal (2014), the Royal Agricultural Society of England Research Medal (2017), and as a Clarivate Analytics Highly Cited Researcher (2019, 2020). He studied Agronomy in the Universidad Católica de Chile and holds a PhD in Genetics from the University of California, Davis.