Professor Krzysztof Kowalczyk, who is currently the director of the Institute of Genetics, Plant Breeding and Biotechnology, and dean of the Faculty of Agrobioengineering of the University of Life Sciences in Lublin, became the rector of this university in the 2020-2024 term.

In 1987, he graduated from the Faculty of Agriculture at the Agricultural University of Lublin (predecessor of the University of Life Sciences), and in the same year he started working at the Institute of Plant Genetics, Breeding and Biotechnology. In 1996 he obtained a PhD degree in agricultural sciences. In 2002 he obtained a postdoctoral degree in agricultural sciences in the field of agronomy, specializing in genetics and plant breeding.

Prof. Kowalczyk mainly deals with issues of wheat and oat resistance to powdery mildew, the identification and use of molecular markers in the study of cereal plants and the analysis of the expression of selected genes of crop and model plants induced under stress, as well as the development of DNA markers useful in the selection of agricultural plants.