Martin received a veterinary degree and a doctorate in Veterinary Medicine from the Ludwig-
Maximilians University in Munich, and a Ph.D. in Food Science from Cornell, where he currently is
the Gellert Family Professor of Food Safety. His research interests focus on farm-to-table microbial
food quality and food safety and the application of molecular tools to study the transmission of
foodborne pathogens and spoilage organisms. His team has published over 300 peer reviewed
publications, which have been cited over 10,000 times. He and his team are regularly asked to help
industry with a range of microbial food safety and quality challenges. He was a member of the
Listeria Outbreak Working Group, which was honored by a USDA Secretary’s Award for Superior
Service in 2000. He also received the Young Scholars award from the American Dairy Science
Association in 2002, the Samuel Cate Prescott Award from Institute of Food Technologists’ in 2003,
the International Life Science Institute North America Future Leaders Award in 2004, and the
American Meat Institute Foundation Scientific Achievement Award in 2011. He is a fellow of the
Institute of Food Technologists (IFT), a fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology (AAM),
and a member of the International Academy of Food Science and Technology.