Mike along with lab members Andres (postdoc), Joshua (grad student), and Cian (undergrad) had a great time at the Botany conference in Boise, ID. Mike and Andres gave talks and Cian presented a poster (see pic).
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Kerrie, the RET (research experience for teachers), in our lab piloted an inquiry module for Chicago Public School high school interns. This module exposes students to the legume-rhizobium mutualism. This work is being funded by Mike's Biota Award from the Walder Foundation.
We hosted a workshop on Data Nuggets for pre-RETs (pre-service research experience for teachers) in Mike's NSF program and other teachers in the Chicago region. Data Nuggets are classroom modules that engage students in actual scientific data. The workshop was a great success and was jointly funded by NSF and the Walder Foundation.
Congrats to lab undergrad Cian Dotson for being awarded a Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) from the American Society of Plant Biologists! This award provides a full time stipend for Cian to conduct research on the impacts of plant soil feedbacks on microbiomes and the role of rhizobia in structuring the broader microbiome community. Here is more information on the SURF award:
https://aspb-surf.secure-platform.com/a/page/closed Congrats to the bumper crop of seniors graduating from our lab! Way to go Thew, Manar, Edgar, Nicolle, Viviana, and Sarah. We really appreciate all of your hard work and contributions to the lab! Mike was able to catch up with a few of our seniors at graduation.
Wohoo! Lab grad student Victoria Martinez was awarded a Summer Graduate Fellowship from the Smithsonian! Vic will be spending the summer collaborating with Dr. Jun Wen in DC at the National Museum of Natural History to study phylogeography in new world Astragalus. Here is a pic of Vic at the Smithsonian:
Wohoo! Mike was awarded a BIOTA Award from the Walder Foundation! Here is the project summary:
Illinois is renowned as the Prairie State. However, today less than 0.1% of Illinois’ native prairie remains. Thus, prairie restoration is a major conservation priority in the Chicago region. One of the major challenges facing restoration is that restored communities do not harbor the same level of biodiversity as native remnant prairies. This proposal seeks to assess the role of key plant microbiome interactions in remnant and restored communities and how microbiome inoculations can be used to enhance native plant diversity in restored habitats. For this work, Michael will integrate greenhouse experiments with field studies in the local forest preserves and provide research experiences for Chicago Public School teachers. https://www.walderfoundation.org/biota-awards Here is a link to a video about the project: https://vimeo.com/840921679 Congrats to grad student Quinn for successfully defending her thesis! Quinn did such an amazing job! Her work examined population genetics in Astragalus lentiginosus and used morphometric analysis of fruit morphological variation. Some of her undergrads brought her gifts! We will REALLY miss Quinn!
Mike is honored to serve on the American Society of Plant Biologist Excellence in Education Committee. ASPB has such a fantastic commitment to outreach and education and Mike is happy to contribute!
Check out our new collaborative paper in mBIO mapping the genetic basis of partner quality, the fitness benefits that a plant receives from interactions with a particular microbial partner. Here we used genome wide associations studies (GWAS) in which two Medicago genotypes were each inoculated with 191 different strains of rhizobia that I collected from the native range in Europe. Congrats to Rebecca Batstone for leading this project! Check it out:
doi: 10.1128/mbio.01823-22 |
Check out what's new in the Grillo lab here and on twitter:
https://twitter.com/grillolab |