We are very happy to partner with collaborators at Kansas State University and the University of Kansas to study the interdependence between the occurrence, phenotype, genotype, and rhizosphere (soil microbes) of a dominant tallgrass prairie plant, Big Bluestem (Andropogon gerardii)! This is a project funded by the US Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. On this end, we’ll be constructing highly-hierarchical Bayesian models to test functional hypotheses about biological levels of organization, from soil microbiome to genes to leaves.
We’ll be hiring a master’s level statistics student in the coming year. If you’re interested, please let me know!
Honorable Collaborators: “Sonny” Tuan Lee, Sara Baer, Maggie Wagner, and Ari Jumpponen
Sponsor: US Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture