Patrick Schnable elected to National Academy of Inventors

Early in his career as an agronomy professor, Patrick Schnable started wondering if he could build a startup from his plant genetics research. He knew it was common at some institutions, but it didn't seem to come up often on his own campus. He wasn't even sure it was allowed.

He soon found it wasn't just permissible. It was encouraged. Interested faculty could carve out a portion of their time to work on entrepreneurial activities, if necessary, while using university labs, equipment and other facilities for reasonable rates. The support was palpable and, crucially, it was clear. It helped set Schnable on a path that led to his induction into the National Academy of Inventors, an honor the academy announced Dec. 11.

"The most important thing was the attitude that this is a good thing for faculty to be doing," Schnable, C.F. Curtiss Distinguished Professor and Iowa Corn Endowed Chair in Genetics, recalled about his first steps into business-building.

In the decades since, he said, the emphasis on turning Iowa State innovation into real-world market solutions has grown, as has the infrastructure that nurtures and sustains entrepreneurship.

"It's talked about much more, and there are many more programs than there were back then. In the late 1990s, it was considered a good thing to do. But it's become even more widely appreciated, and there's even more encouragement," said Schnable, director of the Plant Sciences Institute and the Baker Scholar of Agricultural Entrepreneurship.

With strong institutional backing and collaboration with colleagues from numerous fields outside of his expertise in the genetic control of corn traits, Schnable has founded five startups in his 37 years as an Iowa State faculty member and holds 17 U.S. utility patents and two plant variety protections.

Recognizing those accomplishments, National Academy of Inventors (NAI) members elected Schnable as one of its 2025 fellows. He joins a class of 185 new fellows in the NAI, the highest professional distinction awarded exclusively to inventors. 

"NAI fellows are a driving force within the innovation ecosystem, and their contributions across scientific disciplines are shaping the future of our world," said NAI president Paul Sanberg.

Showing public funding's value

Schnable said he was thrilled to hear of his election to the NAI and considers it further validation of the critical role of public research funding. Some of his protected discoveries and some of the businesses he's created were built on a foundation of taxpayer-funded research licensed from the ISU Research Foundation, he said. Over the years, research funding pays off for society, leading to improvements such as better medical treatment and a more stable food supply.

"The lifestyles we live now are due in large part to prior investments in research," he said.

Schnable also credited his various collaborators, which include engineers, computer scientists and statisticians.

"I didn't create any of these companies by myself. Each one was a group effort, and I learned a lot from my colleagues each time," he said.

Schnable continues to run Dryland Genetics, a startup founded with his son and fellow plant scientist, James Schnable. They are developing higher-yielding varieties of proso millet, a grain crop that can be used in many of the same ways as corn but requires less than half of the water per bushel of production.

Schnable will be recognized at the NAI's annual conference in Los Angeles in June and is looking forward to meeting some of the group's nearly 2,300 fellows, who hold more than 86,000 U.S. patents and 20,000 licensed technologies. Innovations by NAI fellows, including 11 other Iowa State faculty, have generated an estimated $3.8 trillion in revenue and 1.4 million jobs.

More Iowa State fellows in the NAI

• Eric Cochran, elected in 2024, Mary Jane Skogen Hagenson and Randy L. Hagenson Professor of chemical and biological engineering
• Matthew Darr, 2024, Professor and John Deere Endowed Chair in Ag Innovation, professor of agricultural and biosystems engineering, director of the BioCentury Research Farm and director of the Digital Ag Innovation Lab
• Robert C. Brown, 2023, Anson Marston Distinguished Professor in Engineering and the Gary and Donna Hoover Chair in Mechanical Engineering
• Balaji Narasimhan, 2019, Anson Marston Distinguished Professor in Engineering, the Vlasta Klima Balloun Faculty Chair and director of the Nanovaccine Institute
• Guru Rao, 2019, professor emeritus of biochemistry, biophysics and molecular biology and a former associate vice president for research
• Costas Soukoulis, 2018, late Distinguished Professor in Liberal Arts and Sciences  and a former senior scientist at the Ames National Laboratory
• Max Rothschild, 2017, Charles F. Curtiss Distinguished Professor Emeritus in Agriculture and Life Sciences
• Patrick Halbur, 2016, emeritus professor and former chair of veterinary diagnostic and production animal medicine
• Surya Mallapragada, 2016, Anson Marston Distinguished Professor in Engineering, Carol Vohs Johnson Chair in Chemical and Biological Engineering, associate vice president for research and a scientist for the Ames National Laboratory
• Iver Anderson, 2015, retired adjunct professor of materials science engineering and former senior metallurgist for the Ames National Laboratory
• Jonathan Wickert, 2014, provost emeritus, Presidential Professor in mechanical engineering