The Evans Lab studies how ecological knowledge can improve sustainability. We focus on soil microbiomes - the bacteria, fungi, and archaea in the soil that govern soil fertility, carbon content of soils and air, soil hydrology, and plant and crop growth. We are interested in how soils and microbes respond to disturbances like climate change, and what properties make them resilient. We aim to find scientific solutions to environmental problems on land, and in addition to research, tell science stories.

We address these topics collaboratively as a lab, with other disciplines (including social sciences), and with non-academic partners and communities. We hope advancing ecological knowledge can help better predict ecosystem responses to global change, enhance services, and preserve biodiversity. Since everyone is needed to reach these goals, non-academic partners and fostering inclusion in STEM will also be essential!

Welcome to our site! We are an academic group at Michigan State University's Kellogg Biological Station. Read more about PI Sarah Evans and the Lab members, or explore our research through a description of its Themes or public Communication pieces. Check out our photo Gallery and info about Joining the lab. Enjoy!

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Contact Information

Physical location: 
Kellogg Biological Station, Hickory Corners, Michigan, USA
   Sarah's office: Academic Building 341 
   Soil lab: Academic 329 

Mailing address:
  Michigan State University
  3700 E. Gull Lake Dr.
  Hickory Corners, MI

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Lab News

August 2026 

• Brandon returns from LLNL after successfully used NanoSims imaging to see dizaotrophs and hyphae enriched with isotopic C and N. He also spent time out presenting his work to various groups and honing his imaging skills. 
• Sam and Holly deployed and harvested passive air samplers in the LTER. Quite a bit of tractor dodging and equipment trials in this pilot, but we're excited to see what microbial communities we've captured. Holly also used the active air samplers to capture comparison samples. 
• Sarah and Holly attend the GLBRC All Scientist Meeting in Lake Geneva Wisconsin. They had a great time catching up with collaborators, sitting in on brainstorming sessions and checking out the local town. 
• Big congrats as Brandon wins the 2026 GLBRC Mentoring award! Lab members past and present appreciate all his support. Read the press release all about his efforts. 
• Sam is hired as faculty at nearby Grand Valley State University! We're going to miss him in the lab, but happy to have him so close and look forward to continued collaboration!
• Brandon travels to the CABBI All Scientist Meeting as an invited guest to share his work on the split plot diazotroph labeling experiment. 
• Sarah takes the lead on a joint Fitzpatrick-Evans lab paper looking at the microbiome of endangered Atelopus frogs in Ecuador and the prevalence of Bd in the community. 
• Brandon traveled to Cairns, Australia to present his research at the International Conference on Mycorrhiza (ICOM), hosted by the International Mycorrhiza Society.
• Sam takes on the herculean task of inventorying all of the Evans lab 16S sequences. Almost 10 years of data! 
• Lab Alumni Heather Kittredge works with Sarah to publish work from her dissertation. Learn how extracellular DNA can mask bacterial responses to soil rewetting.

April 2026

• Brandon heads to Lawrence Livermore National Lab (LLNL) to begin NanoSIMS imaging on his AMF/diazotroph splitpot experiement. With isotope labeling he's able to visualize carbon and nitrogen movement through bacteria, hyphae and roots. NatSci wrote an update on his internship. 
• Holly and Sam prepare to deploy passive air microbiome samplers into the LTER (modeled after Bala Chaudhary's lab MWAC protocol). We're looking forward to pairing with existing active air sampling datasets.
• Lab Alumni Tayler Ulbrich and Lukas Bell-Dereske publish work with former REU students in Rhizosphere. Check out how switchgrass soil microbes effect germination and growth under drought. 
• Another Lab Alumni paper! Caitlin joined post docs and graduate students at KBS, Cedar Creek LTER and Konza LTER to look at drivers of grassland resistance and resilience to climate disturbance
• Prem is awarded the ISME20 Travel Grant to share his work in New Zealand this August.
• Sam is working on generating a bioinformatics pipeline for analyzing microbial communities from prairies as part of his metananlysis. 
• Sarah works with co-PI Nick Haddad to envision the future of the KBS LTER
• Pulak is putting the finishing touches on his SEM model paper looking at soil health on farms across the Midwest.
• Brandon presents his work on NanoSIMs to the LLNL µBiospheres Science Focus Area and Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry groups. He'll also visit UC-Davis (and lab alum Glade Bogar) for a presentation to junior graduate students. He continues to make great connections in California
• Prem continues to look for drought effects on the fungal and bacterial communities sampled from the Rain Exclusion Experiment. 
• Pulak writing up work on effect of irrigation on AMF and bacterial responses to drought. 
• Sarah participates in LTAR stakeholder and scientists meeting discussing results and next steps in the project. The meeting was led by lab alum Tayler Ulbrich!
• Prem presents his work at KBS Colloquim, talking about the microbial responses to drought in both the REX experiment at KBS and the DIGME project utilizing samples from around the world.
• Prem and Pulak celebrated their last day at KBS. Wishing both of you all the best in your careers and looking forward to reading about your time in upcoming papers! Thanks for all your hard work. 

January 2026

• Post doc Sam Barnett joins the lab! Housed in the Evans lab, he'll be co-advised by Sarah, Christine Sprunger and Nick Haddad working on a meta-analysis study exploring the impact of prairie strips and restoration on belowground microbial communities in Midwest agricultural settings. Welcome Sam!!
• Glade publishes a methods paper on safer microscale assays for EPS quantifiation in the Journal of Microbiological Methods. We're excited to have this new method available to the community,
• Prem is awarded an EEB Professional Horizons Travel Grant for American Society of American Annual Conference.
• Brandon receives a DOE SCGSR Award to use nanoSIMS to visualize nutrient exchange between Switchgrass, AMF, and free-living diazotrophs.  He'll spend most of the semester at Lawrence Livermore National Lab working with Erin Nuccio.
• Pulak continues working on Bacterial and AMF community analysis of drought resilience within the LTER resource gradient.
• Prem moving forward on several REX manuscipts including a drought response synthesis paper and a more focused fungicide treament microbial response. Keep your eyes out for those!
• Sarah begins serving on several new committees including IBIO Faculty Advisory Committee (FAC), EEB Seed Grant Committee and KBS Academic Programs.
• Pulak working on a Structural Equation Model for the CNH2 project  to identify the direct and indirect effects of management practices (e.g., irrigation, cover crops, and tillage) on microbial communities and their influence on soil health and  productivity
• Sarah continues to weave threads inspired by her sabbatical in Ecuador. This includes finding opportunities for training in science communication, maps, and storytelling.
• Brandon completes harvest of his greenhouse study, a split pot, stable isotope probed investigation of AMF and diazotroph affects on Switchgrass. Final "field" work of his PhD!!
• Holly continues management of both Evans and KBS Molecular Ecology and Genomics (MEG) labs. Use of the shared MEG lab has ramped up in 2025, keeping her on her toes!

October 2025

• Adina Howe from Iowa State and CABBI visits the lab and gives a KBS seminar on the microbiome shifts between oilcane and sugarcane. The lab had a blast hosting and talking about MAGs, microbes and bioenergy!
• GLBRC holds their annual Sustainability Meeting at KBS with Sarah, Brandon and Holly attending. Sarah and Brandon present current work as well as ideas for the future directions. Both Brandon's fungal ingrowth core experiment in the resource gradient and his split pot isotope labeling experiment are highlighted
• Brandon's participates in the Inter-BRC Microbiome Group  which submits a manuscript on their cross BRC meta-analysis for a core micrbiome. 
• Prem and Pulak shared research updates at the REX and CNH2 held project workshops, respectively
• Sarah's Global Change Biology class switches to the fall semester
• Lab Alumni Taylor Ulbrich publishes her paper looking at farmer understanding of soil health in Journal of Soil and Water Conservation- check out the publications page to read!
• Pulak presents his work on long term irrigation effects on AMF and soil microbial responses to drought in soybean at KBS Colloqium
• Brandon uses isotope labeling on his split pot AMF/diazotroph experiment and has begun to harvest. Thanks to the whole lab for their help!
• Holly led the lab through sucessful safety inspections with MSU's EHS 

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