Plant-microbial associations contribute to plant fitness by enhancing growth, stress tolerance and disease resistance. These interactions ultimately influence crucial ecosystem processes such as food production, nutrient and carbon cycling, and biodiversity maintenance. However, the functional causes and consequences of realized plant-microbe interaction networks remain poorly understood. That is, do plants select more beneficial microbes under abiotically harsh conditions, and do those selected microbes provide fitness advantages to the plants? For answering these questions, this project will combine field and greenhouse experiments with DNA and RNA molecular analyses. The project will develop an integrative modelling framework that dynamically links species occurrences, species abundances, gene expressions and phenotypic traits.

2025

2029