Samantha has over 24 years of experience in the BioFuels industry. She started her career as a producer holding a variety of roles such as Lab, EHS, Quality and Plant Management. She currently leads the Sales & Technical Service teams for Grain Processing in North America. In this role, she is responsible to ensure customers in both the Carb Processing and Fuel Ethanol industry are supported as IFF strives to help them meet their goals.

Dr. Matt Garner is a founding director and research leader at The RANGE,  an industry-led organization advancing agricultural innovation and economic development in the Texas Panhandle. His work focuses on food processing, livestock nutrition, and agricultural technology commercialization, with a historical focus on ruminant nutrition. He is an inventor on 16 issued U.S. patents.

Florentino Lopez is an independent agricultural consultant and founder of Creando Mañana, LLC, where he supports domestic and international market development for sorghum and other agricultural products. Lopez brings more than 35 years of agricultural experience spanning livestock production, international trade, technical education, relationship development, and direct product sales.

John Duff is Founder and CEO of Serō Ag Strategies, where he works with ethanol producers, commodity organizations and agribusinesses on sustainability, market development and regulatory strategy. Building on experience from his family’s West Texas farm and previous leadership with National Sorghum Producers, John helped develop a NSP’s $70 million USDA-funded framework that enables ethanol plants to measure and verify farm-level greenhouse gas emissions. Today, he helps organizations translate farm data into practical business value through carbon intensity, renewable fuels and supply chain initiatives.

Matt Durler is  Managing Director of the National Sorghum Producers Advancing Markets for Producers initiative, operating at the forefront of renewable fuels, grain processing, and sustainable agriculture. Drawing on a background that ranges from managing operations and risk in the ethanol industry to running a fourth-generation farm and ranch in western Kansas, Matt offers a practical perspective on grain quality and processing efficiency. Today, he addresses regional sorghum quality trends across the High Plains, their practical implications for ethanol facilities, and how leveraging farm-level data can create measurable value across the supply chain.

Amie is a technical service account manager for IFF and lives in Wichita, Kansas. She has served in this role for 8 years, providing ethanol facilities with her expertise and guidance to achieve optimal fermentation performance. Before joining IFF, Amie worked with a leading yeast manufacturer for ethanol fermentation and an ethanol plant in Kansas, totaling 13 years of experience. Amie is passionate about the ethanol industry and provides a systems approach to identifying best practices within yeast fermentation. She obtained her master’s degree from the University of Nebraska, focusing on nitrogen liberation and anaerobic fermentation within ruminant nutrition.

Ryan Mass developed an early passion for feeding the animals that serve humanity on the family farm in Iowa. He answered an open call to work in a nutrition lab at Iowa State University in 1991 and a nutritionist was born. He received a PhD from the University of Nebraska, where he managed the ruminant lab, and met his wife. He has advocated for both buyers and sellers of animal feed ingredients since 2003. Before joining Team Sorghum a year ago, he worked for the premier fuel ethanol technology company in the world, serving as their Director of Nutrition R & D. He currently advises the National Sorghum Producers’ animal feeding subaward to the $70M AMP grant, reads voraciously, and enjoys good coffee.

Nathan Elam, Ph.D., is a Consulting Nutritionist at Nutrition Service Associates, where he bridges cutting-edge animal science with practical feedyard management across North America. Earning his doctorate from New Mexico State University, Nathan brings deep roots in the cattle industry to his work with feedlot operators, delivering data-driven nutritional strategies, ration formulations, and herd health solutions. Known for a producer-focused approach, he specializes in optimizing feed efficiency, metabolic health, and custom feeding programs designed to drive bottom-line profitability and sustainable livestock production.

Dennis Crawley managed the dairy farm at Iowa State University in the 1990s while pursuing graduate studies, completing his MS degree in 1995. He worked as nutrition consultant for Farmland Industries for 4 years, then Land O Lakes Purina for 4 years, then Compass Nutrition for 12 years. In 2014 he started Integrity Dairy Consulting, which today works with many large progressive dairies in the High Plains region.  His humble approach to dairy nutrition belies his profound influence in the industry.