This $225,000 Project Grant awarded by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) (CFDA 10.310) will fund research at Oregon State University (OSU) to study the relationship between wheat cultivars, their associated microbial communities, and the impact on drought tolerance.
The overarching goal of this 2-year project is to advance the basic understanding of how wheat host genotype and drought stress influence the root-associated microbial community. Specifically, the research will leverage drought-susceptible and drought-tolerant wheat cultivars from the Pacific Northwest to examine how genotype and environmental factors impact the wheat rhizosphere microbiome under drought conditions. The findings aim to identify potential solutions for improving drought tolerance in existing wheat cultivars. The work will be conducted by the research team at OSU, which has extensive expertise in agriculture, crop science, and environmental microbiology.
Generated 3/4/25, 5:41 AM