Researchers in Kadeem Gilbert’s lab are using experimental treatments within the KBS LTER to look at how leaves regulate their external pH conditions, which may impact how they interact with insect herbivores and microbes.
For almost 40 years, researchers at the KBS LTER have studied interactions among plants, microbes, insects, management, and the environment to learn how agriculture can provide both high yields and environmental outcomes that benefit society. One might assume that after all that time, every hypothesis has already been tested! Yet, we continually find there are fresh perspectives and new things to discover about our cropping systems and agricultural landscapes.
A research team at KBS, led by Kadeem Gilbert, is finding new ways to use experimental treatments within the LTER. Their research focuses on the ability of leaves to regulate their external pH conditions, which is a trait of interest that may play some role in plant biotic interactions with other organisms like insect herbivores or microbes (including pathogens). While previous research from their group looked at leaf surface responses to external pH change, there is little understanding of this trait in general, including how physiologically active it is, how it varies across and within species, and what are the consequences of differences in leaf surface pH to organisms that would colonize that microhabitat.
In one study, they used the Resource Gradient Experiment to see whether levels of soil nitrogen might influence the ability of maize to buffer against acid rain. In another study, they focused on dandelion, a species that is almost entirely clonal, in both prairie strip and switchgrass treatments within the Main Cropping Systems Experiment (MCSE) to look at plasticity in different traits and better attribute that plasticity to the environment. They observed that dry leaf pH has passive responses to external conditions irrespective of environment, whereas wet pH measurement response curves varied depending on environment, suggesting some more active, possibly adaptive regulation of plasticity in that trait.
Kadeem Gilbert emphasizes: “What the LTER has allowed us to do is chip away at basic physiology, by relying on the long-term experimental treatments as a form of environmental controls with replication.”
KBS LTER is proof that new ideas are always just around the corner, even for experiments continually running for over 30 years. Maintaining long-term experiments is crucial so that the data is available for the next generation of researchers to explore, discover, and collaborate with others.