REU Site: Microbial community interactions and functions

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This REU Site award to The University of Tennessee, located in Knoxville, TN and will support the training of 10 students for 10 weeks during the summers of 2021- 2023. It is anticipated that a total of 30 students, primarily from schools with limited research opportunities or from an under-represented group, will be trained in the program. Students will learn how research is conducted, and many will present the results of their work at scientific conferences. Assessment of the program will be done thru the online SALG URSSA tool. Students will be tracked after the program in order to determine their career paths, and be asked to respond to an automatic email sent via the NSF reporting system.The program focuses on microbiology and the interplay between the microbial community structure and microbial community function. Housed in the Department of Microbiology, the site has more than 20 faculty who will serve as mentors. These faculty also have affiliations with Earth & Planetary Sciences, Biosystems Engineering & Soil Sciences, Civil & Environmental Engineering and Earth & Planetary Science. There is a wide range of very interesting and exciting projects for the students that span microbiology in environments spanning oceans and lakes, caves and polar regions, industrial and agricultural sites. Applications for this program can be submitted through the program website (https://microreu.utk.edu/). Students will be selected by a committee of faculty. More information about the program is available by visiting https://microreu.utk.edu/, by contacting the program director (Tennessee.microbiology.REU@gmail.com) or by contacting the PI (Professor Steven Wilhelm, wilhelm@utk.edu) or the co-PI (Dr. Gary LeCleir, glecleir@utk.edu).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.