NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology FY 2021: Biological Soil Crusts as a Model System in the Context of Climate Change

这一行动为NSF 2021财年生物学博士后研究奖学金提供了资金，综合研究调查了支配基因组、环境和表型之间相互作用的生命规则。该奖学金支持博士后研究员的研究和培训，并有助于以创新的方式更好地理解生活规则。生物土壤结皮是由苔藓、地衣和蓝藻组成的一个活的联合体，它们生活在世界各地的旱地土壤表面。除了调节土壤稳定性和肥力等大量重要的生态系统属性外，生物结壳还为检验长期存在的生态理论提供了新的方法。该项目将研究重要的旱地生物结壳，以及与生物结壳一起发生的土壤微生物群落和氮循环。具体地说，这项研究将评估生物壳和土壤微生物的多样性如何影响关键的氮循环功能，以及这些相互作用如何影响气候变化。这项研究对于理解生物多样性在多个层面上如何影响生态系统的功能特别相关。该研究员还将与区域土地管理者分享这项研究，包括通过在Arches国家公园举办的研讨会，并通过当地的School to Science计划指导当地高中生。该项目整合了分子生物学、生物地球化学和生态学，以跨越生命层次中的多个层次(例如，分子、微生物、生物壳和生态系统功能)，创造了一种测试生物多样性生态系统功能理论的新方法。生物壳在很小的区域内包含大量的多样性，并进行独特的竞争和促进相互作用，使它们成为检验生态理论的理想模式系统。这位研究员将评估生物多样性和微生物多样性是如何相互关联的，以及它们是如何相互影响氮循环的。这位研究员将使用目测评估来表征生物多样性，并使用定量稳定同位素探测和扩增序列来评估微生物群落的多样性。为了更全面地了解生物群落生态系统，这位研究员将在评估不同生物群落演替状态下的总氮库和可提取氮库的同时，利用一项独一无二的现场变暖实验，在模拟气候变化的同时检查氮循环的标记基因。综上所述，对生物壳、相关的异养生物和生物地球化学的探索将为群落、多样性和功能之间的基本关系提供一个新的视角。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biology for FY 2021, Integrative Research Investigating the Rules of Life Governing Interactions Between Genomes, Environment and Phenotypes. The fellowship supports the research and training of a post-doctoral fellow and contributes to an improved understanding of the Rules of Life in innovative ways. Biological soil crusts (biocrusts) are a living consortium of mosses, lichens, and cyanobacteria that inhabit the surface of dryland soils worldwide. In addition to regulating a large number of important ecosystem properties, such as soil stability and fertility, biocrusts offer new ways to test long-standing ecological theory. The project will examine important dryland biocrusts, and the soil microbial communities and nitrogen cycling that occur together with biocrusts. Specifically, the research will assess how the diversity of biocrusts and soil microbes affect key nitrogen cycle functions and how these interactions influence climate change. This research is particularly relevant to understanding how biodiversity at multiple levels impacts how ecosystems function. The fellow will also share this research with regional land managers, including through a workshop in Arches National Park and mentor local high school students through a local School to Science program.This project integrates molecular biology, biogeochemistry, and ecology to span multiple layers in the hierarchy of life (e.g., molecules, microbes, biocrusts, and ecosystem function), creating a novel approach to test biodiversity ecosystem-functioning theory. Biocrusts contain a large amount of diversity in a small area and engage in unique competitive and facilitative interactions, making them an ideal model system to test ecological theory. The fellow will assess how biocrust and microbial diversity relate to each other and how they interactively affect nitrogen cycling. The fellow will characterize biocrust diversity using a visual assessment and assess diversity of microbial communities using quantitative stable isotope probing and amplicon sequencing. To understand the biocrust ecosystem more fully, the fellow will examine marker genes for nitrogen cycling at the same time as assessing total and extractable nitrogen pools under different biocrust successional states and with simulated climate change using a one-of-a-kind in situ warming experiment. Taken together this exploration of biocrusts, associated heterotrophs, and biogeochemistry will offer a new look into the fundamental relationships between communities, diversity, and function.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.