Studying how environmental bacteria make themselves and their world conductive, and how we can harness them in biotechnology or bioelectronics.

Plant biochemistry and cell biology with a focus on the molecular basis of plant-pollinator and plant-microbe interactions.

I am interested in determinants of abundance, community composition, and diversity of trees and lianas in temperate and tropical forests.

Genetics, physiology and synthetic biology of environmental, metal-loving microbes

Circadian regulation of plant growth and abiotic stress response; influence of single-cell circadian networks on organ function.

Using modern microbial ecosystems to unlock Earth’s past, present, and future. Evolution and ecology of photosynthesis in extreme environments.

Our lab studies links between microbial community structure and ecosystem functioning in a variety of experimental settings.

Arabidopsis de-etiolation, seed development, genetics, epigenetics, and genomics.

Studying metabolic biochemistry in plant and microbial organisms; focused on metabolite damage and repair associated with the TCA cycle.

Plant physiology

Our lab studies ecosystem processes and community dynamics in seasonally dry tropical forests from microbial to biome-wide scales.

Forest ecology and plant physiological ecology

Evolutionary genomics in plants and microbes, legume-rhizobia symbiosis, evolution in urban environments

Uncovering RNA- and phage-based regulation in bacteria to reveal how microbes adapt in the gut, during stress, and in plant symbioses.

We study membrane proteins that transport nutrients or metabolites across the membrane. We use electrophysiology to measure transport activity.

Botany, genetics, phylogenetics, taxonomy, ecology & natural history of figs, cannabis, Minnesota flora and New Guinea flora.

Plant systematics, Phylogenetics, and Evolutionary genomics

Genome engineering and synthetic biology for crop improvement