Project Grant 2209151

This National Science Foundation Project Grant of $138,000 supports an NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology for fiscal year 2022 under the Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074). The fellowship funds research and training investigating the role of genomic preadaptation and physiological state in modulating bacterial invasion success. Specifically, the fellow will quantify invasion outcomes across diverse Pseudomonas aeruginosa strains isolated from different environments. The fellow will assess the influence of phylogenetic relatedness, genomic factors, and physiological states on a strain's ability to establish in a novel environment containing a competitor species. Machine learning approaches will be developed to link invasion outcomes to genetics and predict invasion success in untested strains. In addition to gaining research skills, the fellow will mentor undergraduate students to broaden participation in science, with a focus on historically underserved institutions.