Research Interests: For
plants and animals, bacterial colonization and infection can provide dramatic benefits to
health, growth, and reproduction. Yet, bacterial mutualism is often
evolutionarily unstable: harmful mutants can invade symbiont populations and
cause cooperation to collapse. The Sachs Lab
tests fundamental theory about the evolution, ecology, and mechanistic bases of
plant-bacterial mutualism.
Our empirical interests are broad and we use a
combination of field, experimental, cytological, in vitro, and genomic approaches. There are three overlapping
research programs that we focus upon: I) We investigate the coevolution of bacterial exploitation and
plant control. II) We study the
evolution and epidemiology of plant-associated bacteria, focusing on key traits
such as epidemic spread and multi-drug resistance. III) We examine how host plants constrain bacterial exploitation,
using in vitro, cytological, and genetic tools.