This $119,880 federal Project Grant awarded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) program supports a predoctoral research project to analyze the potential benefits to soil health of reintroducing native arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi in prairie restorations on post-agricultural lands. The research will examine soil structure, nutrients, the AM fungal community composition, and...
This $299,213 federal Project Grant awarded by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) program will support research at North Carolina State University (NC State) to investigate how soil microbiomes respond to organic transition practices and quantify their impacts on carbon dynamics and community resilience. The project will utilize amplicon and metagenome sequencing to assess how different organic amendments like...
This $846,562 federal Project Grant award from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (CFDA 10.310) program supports research at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) to assess the impacts of climate change and land use on soil microbiomes, carbon storage, and plant productivity in the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts. The 3-year study will use novel microbiome analyses and greenhouse experiments to quantify the genomic and...
The University of Massachusetts Amherst will provide agricultural research, extension, and education modules focused on applied research and workforce development through a $708,069 Project Grant from the US Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture. Funded under NIFA's Agriculture and Food Research Initiative competitive grants program, the project aims to train students in applied agricultural research and fundamental education science modules to build confidence...
The U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) awarded a $748,363 Project Grant to the University of California, Davis (UC Davis) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) Foundational Program: Soil Health. The grant supports a 3-year research project to quantify three key soil components - the microbiome structure, organic matter structure, and soil aggregate structure - in order to understand how organic carbon is stabilized in...
The Pennsylvania State University received a $180,000 Project Grant award from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (CFDA 10.310 Agriculture and Food Research Initiative) to conduct research on leveraging soil microbial communities to support sustainable agriculture. The three-year project will utilize controlled greenhouse experiments and long-term field trials to determine the specific microbes and microbial functions promoted by different cover...
This federal Project Grant award from the Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture (USDA-NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) program supports research by Iowa State University to gain a better understanding of plant root microbiomes and the interactions between the microbes within these communities. The $180,000 grant, awarded on June 1, 2023, will fund a 3-year project to study how microbial communities form on corn plant roots and how the...
This $800,000 project grant awarded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) program will support research to advance understanding of two novel systems that integrate circular nutrient economies and ecological nutrient management practices on farms. The key objectives of the 4-year project are to: Determine how adaptive multi-paddock grazing of cover crops affects soil nitrogen...
This federal Project Grant award of $749,889, provided by the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) under the Agriculture and Food Research Initiative (AFRI) program, supports research at Northern Arizona University (NAU) to improve soil management practices and increase soil carbon content. The key objectives are to manipulate soil microbes in intact soil communities to stimulate microbes that break down plant materials, while discouraging microbes that consume other...
This $763,538 federal Project Grant was awarded to the University of Chicago on July 15, 2024 by the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074). The project aims to understand the mechanistic basis of functional robustness in the soil microbiome, connecting detailed microbial processes to broader ecological and environmental outcomes like soil fertility and greenhouse gas emissions. The research objectives include elucidating how soil microbiomes respond to...