PhD studentship (NERC GW4+ DTP) - Understanding the Functional Impacts of Soil Microbial Community Dynamics (September 2025)

About the Partnership

This project is one of a number that are in competition for funding from the NERC Great Western Four+ Doctoral Training Partnership (GW4+ DTP). The GW4+ DTP consists of the Great Western Four alliance of the University of Bath, University of Bristol, Cardiff University and the University of Exeter plus five Research Organisation partners: British Antarctic Survey, British Geological Survey, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology,  the Natural History Museum and Plymouth Marine Laboratory. The partnership aims to provide a broad training in earth and environmental sciences, designed to train tomorrow’s leaders in earth and environmental science. For further details about the programme please see http://nercgw4plus.ac.uk/

Project details

For information relating to the research project please contact the lead Supervisor via B.Watson3@exeter.ac.uk

Project Aims and Methods

Microbes drive soil function, capturing and cycling nutrients to make them available for plants and other organisms. The soil microbiome composition is dynamic, and bacteria regularly migrate into communities, which can change community composition and function. However, we do not understand enough about how microbes interact to be able to predict when invasion can occur and importantly, how these changes affect microbiome activities, such as supporting plant growth, and sequestering carbon.  

Recent work in the gut microbiome showed that certain bacterial communities can prevent bacterial invasion by collectively consuming all the nutrients needed by the invader to grow. We hypothesize that similar principles apply in the soil microbiome, and that the ability of bacteria to invade will depend on i) the size and composition of the bacterial community, and ii) the nutrients in the soil.        

The project will use soil experiments and statistical analyses to explore this theory. There is a lot of scope for the student to drive the direction of this ambitious project to suit their interests. This may include characterising nutrient cycling in the soil, using genomics and microbiological techniques to understand the mechanisms of invader exclusion and conducting plant growth experiments to study beneficial community function.   

Training

The DTP offers funding to undertake specialist training relating to the student’s specialist area of research. 

To apply, please click on the ‘Apply’ button above

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