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Stanford University, USA

“Ectomycorrhizal fungi as keystone species” –March 6^th: Ecology, environment and society, at 9 am

Dr. Kabir Peay completed his master’s degree at the Yale School of Forestry and Environment Science (F&ES) in 2003 and obtained his PhD in 2008 from UC Berkeley’s Dept. of Environmental Science, Policy and Management (ESPM) in Matteo Garbelotto's lab. He did his postdoctoral training at UC Berkeley in the Dept. of Plant & Microbial Biology with Tom Bruns, and at Stanford in the Dept. of Biology with Tadashi Fukami. He was an Assistant Professor in the Dept. of Plant Pathology at the University of Minnesota from 2011-2012 before coming to Stanford in 2012 to join the Dept. of Biology, where he has worked since then.

Dr. Peay’s lab (https://mykophile.com/), studies the ecological processes that structure natural communities and the links between community structure and the cycling of nutrients and energy through ecosystems. Much of their research focuses on plant-fungal root associations, better known as mycorrhizas, which constitute one of the most pervasive mutualisms in terrestrial ecosystems. They work on questions at different scales of this symbiosis: from the root tip to the landscape and biogeographical scales, integrating different levels of research to build a 'roots-to-biomes' understanding of plant-microbe symbiosis.

Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, France.

“Ecology and life-cycle of Tuber melanosporum” – March 7^th: Biodiversity and Physiology, at 9 am.

Dr. Marc-André Selosse is professor at Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle (Paris), University of Gdansk (Department of Plant Taxonomy and Nature Conservation, Poland) and invited professor at University of Kunming (Yunnan, China). His research focuses on the ecology and evolution of mycorrhizas, with research models such as Truffles, Sebacinales, orchids and ectomycorrhizal associations, as well as mycorrhizal networks. He also has a general interest for symbiosis and its evolution. He is head of the French Botanical Society, and member of the French Academy of Agriculture. He is an editor of New Phytologist, Ecology Letters, Botany Letters, Symbiosis and Espèces (outreach in French). He has published more than 160 scientific papers and 150 outreach papers (all downloadable at http://isyeb.mnhn.fr/en/). Dr. Selosse actively teaches at Muséum and in various universities and ‘grandes écoles’ (AgroParisTech, Ecole Normale supérieure at Paris (rue d’Ulm and Lyon). His topics cover plants, algae and fungi (from biology to ecology), biology of interaction, as well as evolution, and he teaches as often as possible in the field. He devotes attention to future biology teachers, and invest in outreach by way of talks, field trips, papers and books.