A major challenge in microbial ecology is to elucidate the mechanisms that allow microorganisms to resist and recover from environmental change. Possible responses to disturbance include ecological (community re-assembly) and evolutionary (phenotypic plasticity, genetic adaptation) mechanisms. Microbial lineages can evolve on very short time scales, altering their physiology and function in ways that influence ecosystem scale processes. There is little research on microbial evolution in global change contexts, even though evolutionary dynamics may accompany or drive shifts in microbial and ecosystem responses to environmental change. This talk will outline a research approach to study microbial eco-evolutionary responses to disturbance.
