Microbes run the world, but we have a limited understanding of how they respond to both natural shifts in environmental conditions, and disturbances driven by human activities. My research aims to understand how microbial communities assemble, partition resources and functional niches, and respond to abiotic changes. I use phylogenetics and phylogenomics paired with metagnomics and metatranscriptomics to answer these questions with both field survyes and experimental manipulations, leveraging spatial and temporal gradients
I am currently a Research Microbiologist at the USDA Agricultural Research Service. I was previously an Assistant Research Professor in the Thermal Biology Institute at Montana State University and a Director's Fellow at Los Alamos National Laboratory. I received my Ph.D. from the University of Oregon. I have the good fortune to work on a wide range of topics, from the effects of severe drought on landscape-level patterns of tree mortality, the impacts of land use change on soil microbial communities in the Amazon rainforest, and changes in the functional diversity of hot spring microbial communities over time. My current work is focused on identifying microbial biocontrol agents that can be used to control invasive plants, such as cheatgrass