Location: Soil, Water & Air Resources Research
Project Number: 5030-11610-006-015-A
Project Type: Cooperative Agreement
Start Date: Jun 1, 2025
End Date: Aug 31, 2026
Objective:
Project aims to improve grower ability to manage plant-microbe symbioses in Iowa corn agriculture through: testing the regional soil and management drivers influencing corn microbiomes in the field with specific emphasis on arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) and Massilia/Oxalobacteraceae community composition, abundance and activity.
Approach:
In collaboration with ARS, cooperator will assess corn root microbiomes and AMF community composition in a regional survey of Iowa soils to determine whether certain soil types, drainage classes, or management systems constrain AMF and Massilia abundance and activity. ARS and cooperator will work with funding organization to identify participating farmer fields and long-term cropping system experiments that span significant Iowa soil types, drainage classes and management practices. Plant and soil samples will be collected during the vegetative stage for assessing AMF colonization, AMF biomass in soil. Cooperator will perform sequencing of bacterial and fungal community composition and analyze linkages between the target organisms and the broader plant microbiome, including nitrifiers.