Principal Investigators
Kirsten Hofmockel, Principal Investigator for the Soil Microbiome Science Focus Area and Soil Incubation Thrust Lead
Dr. Kirsten Hofmockel is the Past President of the Soil Ecology Society, an international organization focused on furthering the science, education and awareness of the importance of soils for human and environmental well-being. She serves as a liaison to the U.S. National Committee for Soil Sciences, which advises the National Academies and represents the interests of the U.S. soil science community in the International Union of Soil Sciences. Hofmockel is a Department of Energy Early Career Award recipient for research focused on how plants, microbes and soils interact to influence carbon storage. She is a Sr. Scientist at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, where she leads the Soil Microbiome Science Focus Area that investigates the basic biology underpinning how soil microbial community members interact to generate beneficial ecosystem functions. Hofmockel holds a joint appointment in the Department of Agronomy at Iowa State University.
Thrust Leads
Ryan McClure, Tractable Thrust Lead
Dr. Ryan McClure is a computational scientist within the Microbiome Science team in the Biological Sciences Division at PNNL. McClure is a member of MicrobiomeSupport and an editor of mSystems.
Sneha Couvillion, Intermediate Complexity Thrust Lead
Dr. Sneha Couvillion is a a Staff Scientist in the Earth and Biological Sciences Directorate at PNNL. Sneha leads a team investigating the impact of drought on plant root exudate chemodiversity and plant-microbe interactions in the rhizosphere.
Amy Zimmerman, Field Thrust Lead
Dr. Amy Zimmerman is a microbial ecologist on the Systems Biology team at PNNL. Her research experience spans the tree of life, from viruses to bacteria to unicellular eukaryotes.
Hyun-Seob Song, Cross-Cutting Modeling Thrust Lead
Dr. Hyun-Seob Song is an Assistant Professor and computational biologist at the University of Nebraska. His research focuses development of microbiome, metabolic and biological network interface models.
Shannon Sheridan, Data Access and Integration Thrust Lead
Shannon Sheridan has a Masters of Library and Information Science and is the research data librarian at PNNL. She focuses on research data management policies, workflows, and publishing for the SFA.
Bill Nelson, KBase Integration Thrust Lead
Dr. Bill Nelson is a computational scientist in the Biological Sciences Division at PNNL. His research involves working on large, collaborative projects investigating mechanisms by which metabolic interactions contribute to community and ecological function.
Research Collaborators
Nikos Kyrpides, Joint Genome Institute
Steve Norberg, Washington State University
Hyun-Seob Song, University of Nebraska
External Advisory Committee
The EAC provides the SFA with guidance on the scientific impact of our tasks and also provides recommendations for future science goals and strategic themes. The members of the EAC were chosen based on their high academic standing, their knowledge of DOE-BER missions, and their complementary expertise as shown below
- James Tiedje, Michigan State University, Microbial ecology and former BERAC Chair
- Susannah Tringe, Joint Genome Institute, Bioinformatics and former DOE-BER Early Career Award Recipient
- Kelly Wrighton, Colorado State University, Metagenomics and DOE-BER PI
- Bruce Hungate, Arizona State University, Quantitative microbial ecology and current BERAC Chair
- Steven Allison, University of California Irvine, Microbial metabolic modeling and DOE-BER PI