The goal of this meeting is to bring together a broad community of researchers working on biological, chemical and agronomic aspects of switchgrass (and close relatives) cultivation and how these are shaped by the plant’s microbiome. 

 

Switchgrass (Panicum virgatum L.), a perennial grass native to the tallgrass prairie, is one of the most promising bioenergy crops in the U.S. Sustainable cultivation of switchgrass is in part enabled by soil-plant-microbial interactions. These complex interactions support the key ecosystem services ranging from carbon sequestration and increased soil fertility to promotion of diverse soil microbial, viral and mesofaunal communities. Yet understanding of the occurrence and regulation of mutualistic switchgrass-microbe interactions, carbon and nutrient exchange between roots, soil food webs, rhizosphere carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus, and water cycles, as well as the impact of switchgrass genotypes on plants' microbiome, remains incomplete. 

 

Bringing together diverse research groups will help collectively advance switchgrass microbiome research for sustainable agriculture and biofuel production by identifying and addressing important questions and challenges in this newly emerging field. During this meeting we will discuss:

- emerging questions in switchgrass microbiome research

- methods and approaches that could be used to address these questions 

- development of new methods and approaches 

- scale dependence of switchgrass microbiomes

- diversity of trophic interactions

- main challenges in this field

- what we can do to address these challenges

- how to use power of interdisciplinary research groups to advance  switchgrass microbiome field