Overview

The Graduate Group in Microbiology is composed of 53 faculty from diverse departments, colleges, and schools (Plant and Microbial Biology; Molecular and Cell Biology; Public Health; Civil and Environmental Engineering; Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering; Environmental Science, Policy, and Management; Nutritional Sciences and Toxicology; Optometry; and Integrative Biology) and is administered by the Department of Plant and Microbial Biology.

The group awards a PhD degree in Microbiology. Students in the group have access to diverse disciplines through an integrated program of study that allows each student to pursue specialized interests. Students gain a breadth of understanding of microbiology from the molecular to the cellular levels of organization, as well as the interactions of microbes—beneficial and pathogenic—with other organisms.

Graduate Program

Microbiology: PhD

Visit Group Website

Faculty and Instructors

* Indicates this faculty member is the recipient of the Distinguished Teaching Award.

Faculty

Rodrigo P. P. Almeida, Associate Professor. Disease ecology, vector, plant disease, Xylella fastidiosa, emerging.
Research Profile

Lisa Alvarez-Cohen, Professor. Environmental microbiology, biodegradation of environmental contaminants, microbial carbon cycling, molecular tools for microbial ecology, metagenomics, biological hazardous waste treatment, bioremediation of groundwater pollutants such as PCE, TCE, DCE, VC, TCA, DCA, MTBE, BTEX, PBDEs, NDMA, Dioxane, PFOS, PFOA, fire-fighting foams.
Research Profile

Rachel B. Brem, Associate Adjunct Professor. Genetics of regulatory variation.
Research Profile

Steven Brenner, Professor. Molecular biology, computational biology, evolutionary biology, bioengineering, structural genomics, computational genomics, cellular activity, cellular functions, personal genomics.
Research Profile

Thomas D. Bruns, Professor. Microbial biology, plant biology, fungi, nucleic acid sequences, basidomycetes, ectomycorrhizal fungi communities.
Research Profile

Bob B. Buchanan, Professor. Biotechnology, environmental policy, plant biology, thioredoxin.
Research Profile

Jamie Cate, Professor. Molecular basis for protein synthesis by the ribosome, RNA, antibiotics, a thermophilic bacterium, escherichia coli.
Research Profile

Michelle Chang, Associate Professor. Biochemistry, enzymology, synthetic biology, biophysics .
Research Profile

John Coates, Professor. Environmental microbiology, Bioremediation, alternative energy production, biogeochemistry.
Research Profile

Laurent Coscoy, Associate Professor. Immunology, viruses, viral infection, immune responses, immune evasion.
Research Profile

John Eugene Dueber, Assistant Professor. Synthetic biology, Metabolic Engineering.
Research Profile

Mary K. Firestone, Professor. Soils, environmental policy, environmental science, policy and management, wildlife, miicrobial biology.
Research Profile

Suzanne Fleiszig, Professor. Immunology, eye, microbiology, infectious disease, corneal physiology, tear film physiology, bacterial pathogenesis, contact lenses, pseudomonas aeruginosa, epithelial cell biology, innate immunity.
Research Profile

N. Louise Glass, Professor. Biofuels, biotechnology, fungal genetics, fungal cell biology.
Research Profile

Britt Glaunsinger, Associate Professor. Virology, gene expression, herpesvirus.
Research Profile

Igor V. Grigoriev, Adjunct Professor. Genomics, fungi, algae, eukaryotes, computational biology, bioinformatics, genome annotation.
Research Profile

Eva Harris, Professor. Public health, infectious diseases.
Research Profile

Jay Keasling, Professor. Microorganism metabolic engineering for environmentally friendly product .
Research Profile

Nicole King, Associate Professor. Genetics, developmental biology, biology, choanoflagellates, multicellularity, evolution of animals, comparative genomics, eukaryotes, host-microbe interactions, bacterial signals.
Research Profile

Arash Komeili, Associate Professor. Microbiology, Biomineralization, bacterial organelles, Magnetic Nanoparticles.
Research Profile

Jennifer Lewis, Assistant Adjunct Professor. Plant-pathogen interactions, plant immunity, type III effector proteins.
Research Profile

Steven E. Lindow, Professor. Microbial ecology, microbial biology, plant biology, plant frost control, bacterial plant diseases, plant disease epidemiology.
Research Profile

Fenyong Liu, Professor. Public health, infectious diseases.
Research Profile

Krishna K. Niyogi, Professor. Genetics, plant and microbial biology, algae, photosynthesis, antioxidants.
Research Profile

Celine Pallud, Associate Professor. Biogeochemistry, iron reduction, metals and contaminants, soil aggregates, selenium kinetics of organic matter degradation, nitrate reduction, soil and environmental biogeophysics, biogeochemical cycles, fate and transport of nutrients, sulfate reduction, wetland soils, littoral sediments, spatial variation in biogeochemical processes.
Research Profile

Daniel A. Portnoy, Professor. Mammalian cells, molecular and cellular basis of microbial pathogenesis, defense against infection, listeria monocytogenes, cell biology of infection, mechanisms of secretion.
Research Profile

Lee Riley, Professor. Public health, infectious diseases, molecular epidemiology, global health, tuberculosis, drug-resistant infections, slum health.
Research Profile

* Jasper D. Rine, Professor. Biology, cell biology, DNA replication, gene regulation, saccharomyces cerevisiae, genetic analysis, genome, cholesterol biosynthetic pathway, modification of proteins, prenylated proteins.
Research Profile

Kathleen Ryan, Associate Professor. Bacterial cell cycle regulation, signal transduction, and regulated proteolysis.
Research Profile

David Savage, Assistant Professor. Synthetic biology and metabolism.
Research Profile

Randy W. Schekman, Professor. Saccharomyces cerevisiae, organelle assembly, intracellular protein transport, assembly of cellular organelles, Alzheimer's Disease.
Research Profile

Michael Shapira, Assistant Professor in Residence. Molecular biology, aging, host-pathogen interactions.
Research Profile

Chris Somerville, Professor. Biochemistry, biotechnology, bioenergy, cell biology, biofuels, cell walls, polysaccharides, cellulose, arabidopsis, cellulose synthase.
Research Profile

Shauna Somerville, Professor. Powdery mildew disease, cell wall integrity sensing, plant-fungal interactions, plant cell walls.
Research Profile

Chelsea Specht, Associate Professor. Molecular evolution, adaptation, plant systematics, evolution of development (evo-devo), evolution of form and function, plant morphology, comparative phylogenetics, floral developmental evolution, diversification rates.
Research Profile

Sarah Stanley, Assistant Professor. Mechanisms of pathogenesis and immune subversion in tuberculosis, protective immunity to tuberculosis, metabolic interactions between hosts and pathogens, development of novel therapeutics for tuberculosis, scientific capacity building, tuberculosis.
Research Profile

Brian J. Staskawicz, Professor. Biotechnology, plant and microbial biology.
Research Profile

Richard S. Stephens, Professor. Molecular genetics, microbiology, infectious disease, pathogenesis.
Research Profile

Michiko Taga, Assistant Professor. Molecular biology, genetics, microbial biology, chemical biology, cofactors, nutrient exchange, microbial communities.
Research Profile

John Taylor, Professor. Evolution, fungi, phylogenomics, mycology, population genomics.
Research Profile

Matthew Traxler, Assistant Professor.

Danielle Tullman-Ercek, Assistant Professor. Bioenergy, synthetic biology, protein engineering, bionanotechnology.
Research Profile

Russell E. Vance, Associate Professor. Immunology, microbiology, infectious disease, molecular and cell biology.
Research Profile

Matthew D. Welch, Professor. Biology, cell motility, the role of the actin cytoskeleton in cell locomotion, shape change, actin filament assembly, bacterial and viral pathogens.
Research Profile

Mary Wildermuth, Associate Professor. Plant-pathogen interactions.
Research Profile

Patricia Zambryski, Professor. Microbial biology, plant biology, plant intercellular communication via plasmodesmata, Agrobacterium, bacterial type IV secretion.
Research Profile

Wenjun Zhang, Assistant Professor. Natural product biosynthesis and engineering for health and bioenergy applications.
Research Profile

Affiliated Faculty

Sangwei Lu, Adjunct Professor. Pathogenesis and stress response of Salmonella serovars, foodborne diseases.
Research Profile