Recent News
Upcoming Events
In July 2010, Matt Wallenstein will participate in the first Summer Soil Institute at Colorado State University- a two-week hands-on training course in soil sciences.
January 2010
The First International Workshop on Environmental Proteomics was held in Keystone, CO in January. Matt Wallenstein was the conference chair, and Shawna McMahon was the program coordinator. A summary of outcomes, and recorded presentations are available here.
November 2009
Holly Hamilton, an undergraduate microbiology major working in our lab was awarded third place for her poster presentation at the regional meeting of the American Society of Microbiology.
Matthew Wallenstein presented an invited talk at the Soil Society of America Meeting titled “Recent advancements in understanding the ecology of enzymes in the environment”. Meg Steinweg and Shawna McMahon were co-authors.
October 2009
Several lab members spent a week in Thule, Greenland to collect Arctic soil samples.
Current Research Themes
ENZYMES IN THE ENVIRONMENT
Microbes release enzymes into the environment to decompose organic matter so that can assimilate the carbon and nutrients contained in it. Our lab examines the abiotic and biotic controls on enzyme production, turnover, and in-situ activities. For more information please check see our website for the Enzymes in the Environment Research Coordination Network (funded by NSF), directed by Matthew Wallenstein.
ARCTIC AND ALPINE MICROBIAL ECOLOGY
From a human perspective, the cold dark environment of Arctic soils appears like an extreme habitat for life. However, these soils are inhabited by a very diverse group of microorganisms that appear well adapted to this environment. In fact, these microbes remain active below freezing, where they continue to decompose the remnants of plant material that is produced during the short growing season. Our research examines the diversity of life in these soils, to understand WHO they are, WHAT they are doing, and HOW they deal with life in the cold and dark.
SOIL MICROBIAL RESPONSES TO CLIMATE CHANGE
One of the major current challenges for ecologists is to predict how ecosystems will function under the predicted range of future climates. Typically, ecologists extrapolate the relationships of temperature and moisture with the rates of various processes that occur in the soil (e.g. decomposition, N cycling) to estimate the rates of these processes under climate change. This approach assumes that these relationships are constant through time. For this assumption to be true, the microbial communities whose activity drives these soil processes either will not change in response to changing climate, or are functionally redundant. This assumption is in contrast to the generally accepted paradigm that plant, animal, and pathogen communities will shift in community composition and function in response to climate change. Our research examines whether microbial communities acclimate or adapt to changing climate. If they do, do the relationships between abiotic drivers and soil process rates also change?
ENVIRONMENTAL PROTEOMICS AND METABOLOMICS
The field of microbial ecology has benefited greatly from recent technological developments in molecular biology. These genomic tools have allowed us to examine the majority of soil bacteria and fungi that are not easily culturable. While these tools allow us to understand the diversity and community composition of soil microbes, understanding the ecology of these organisms is still a difficult challenge. One promising tool for understanding the physiology and function of complex microbial communities is the emerging field of proteomics. Working with Ken Reardon (CSU-Engineering), We are developing tools to extract and identify proteins from soil communities to better understand microbial responses to stress and global change. We are also using high resolution mass spectrometry to evaluate whether different microbial communities metabolize a common substrate differently.