NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology FY 2020: The functional biogeography of ectomycorrhizal fungi: elucidating cross-scale mechanisms that inform global models

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This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2020, Integrative Research Investigating the Rules of Life Governing Interactions Between Genomes, Environment and Phenotypes. The fellowship supports research and training of the fellow that will contribute to the area of Rules of Life in innovative ways. This research will improve understanding of biological interactions between plants and fungi that affect forest response to a rapidly changing climate. The fellow will use a combination of field, laboratory and climate modeling approaches to study how plants interact with symbiotic (helpful) root-associated fungi. Soil nitrogen availability controls forest growth and the fellow will compare how symbiotic fungi in the tropics, temperate forests and boreal forests differ in their impact on tree uptake of nitrogen. By determining how existing fungal communities are linked with certain climatic regions the fellow will forecast future fungal communities in order to predict how forests will respond to a changing climate. To broaden the impact of the work, the fellow will promote student learning and discovery by mentoring and teaching underserved and first-generation high-school and undergraduate students in the field and laboratory. This research uses an integrative approach to align hierarchical levels of analysis between soil properties and the biogeographic community structure and function of ectomycorrhizal (ECM) fungi. The fellow will use a range of sequencing approaches to understand variation in the capacity of ECM communities to scavenge for organic N. Moreover, the fellow will develop statistical approaches to link measurements of ECM decay with the geographic distribution of ECM genera. In so doing, the fellow will constrain current and future plant assimilation of organic N, a source of plant N which is not included in existing earth system models due to poor understanding of its overall contribution to plant growth. Finally, the fellow will use a functional biogeographic framework to forecast the response of ECM symbionts to climatic change. The fellow is being trained in statistical approaches for metagenomic analysis, ecological forecasting and climatic modeling. Working in conjunction with the Stanford School of Education, the fellow will study and implement inquiry-based units bridging field and laboratory approaches. Finally, the fellow will develop, teach and publish educational undergraduate and high-school curricula on soil and microbial ecology.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.