Liana Burghardt

Director of the Center for Root and Rhizosphere Biology; Huck Early Career Chair of Root Biology and Rhizosphere Interactions; Assistant Professor of Plant Science

Liana Burghardt

Research Summary

Plant-microbe-climate interactions; the evolution and ecology of legumes and nitrogen-fixing rhizobia; the genomic basis and environment dependence of root, nodule, and mutualism traits; GWAS/transcriptomics/evolve & resequence methodologies

Huck Graduate Students

Huck Affiliations

Links

Most Recent Publications

Virulence is not directly related to strain success in planta in Clavibacter nebraskensis

D Khokhani, M Veregge, C Hirsch, M Moscou, Liana Burghardt, P Tiffin, 2025, mSystems

Precipitation timing and soil substrate drive phenology and fitness of Arabidopsis thaliana in a Mediterranean environment

Alejandra Martínez-Berdeja, Miki Okada, Martha D. Cooper, Daniel E. Runcie, Liana T. Burghardt, Johanna Schmitt, 2023, Functional Ecology on p. 2471-2487

The evolutionary ecology of rhizobia: multiple facets of competition before, during, and after symbiosis with legumes

Liana T. Burghardt, George C. diCenzo, 2023, Current Opinion in Microbiology

Host-Associated Rhizobial Fitness: Dependence on Nitrogen, Density, Community Complexity, and Legume Genotype

Liana T. Burghardt, Brendan Epstein, Michelle Hoge, Diana I. Trujillo, Peter Tiffin, 2022, Applied and Environmental Microbiology

Phenotypic and genomic signatures of interspecies cooperation and conflict in naturally occurring isolates of a model plant symbiont

Rebecca T. Batstone, Liana T. Burghardt, Katy D. Heath, 2022, Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

Combining GWAS and population genomic analyses to characterize coevolution in a legume-rhizobia symbiosis

Brendan Epstein, Liana T. Burghardt, Katy D. Heath, Michael A. Grillo, Adam Kostanecki, Tuomas Hämälä, Nevin D. Young, Peter Tiffin, 2022, Molecular Ecology

Comparison of nodule endophyte composition, diversity, and gene content between medicago truncatula genotypes

Mannix Burns, Brendan Epstein, Liana T. Burghardt, 2021, Phytobiomes Journal on p. 400-407

Evolving together, evolving apart: measuring the fitness of rhizobial bacteria in and out of symbiosis with leguminous plants

Liana T. Burghardt, 2020, New Phytologist on p. 28-34

Adaptive evolution of plant life history in urban environments

Amanda Gorton, Liana Burghardt, P Tiffin, 2020, on p. 142-156

A select and resequence approach reveals strain-specific effects of medicago nodule-specific PLAT-domain genes

Liana T. Burghardt, Diana I. Trujillo, Brendan Epstein, Peter Tiffin, Nevin D. Young, 2020, Plant Physiology on p. 463-471

Most-Cited Papers

Natural variation for gene expression responses to abiotic stress in maize

Amanda J. Waters, Irina Makarevitch, Jaclyn Noshay, Liana T. Burghardt, Candice N. Hirsch, Cory D. Hirsch, Nathan M. Springer, 2017, Plant Journal on p. 706-717

Modeling the influence of genetic and environmental variation on the expression of plant life cycles across landscapes

Liana T. Burghardt, C. Jessica E. Metcalf, Amity M. Wilczek, Johanna Schmitt, Kathleen Donohue, 2015, American Naturalist on p. 212-227

Select and resequence reveals relative fitness of bacteria in symbiotic and free-living environments

Liana T. Burghardt, Brendan Epstein, Joseph Guhlin, Matt S. Nelson, Margaret R. Taylor, Nevin D. Young, Michael J. Sadowsky, Peter Tiffin, 2018, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America on p. 2425-2430

A Guide to Genome-Wide Association Mapping in Plants

Liana T. Burghardt, Nevin D. Young, Peter Tiffin, 2017, Current protocols in plant biology on p. 22-38

Multiple paths to similar germination behavior in Arabidopsis thaliana

Liana T. Burghardt, Brianne R. Edwards, Kathleen Donohue, 2016, New Phytologist on p. 1301-1312

Applying developmental threshold models to evolutionary ecology

Kathleen Donohue, Liana T. Burghardt, Daniel Runcie, Kent J. Bradford, Johanna Schmitt, 2015, Trends in Ecology and Evolution on p. 66-77

Secondary dormancy dynamics depends on primary dormancy status in Arabidopsis thaliana

Gabriela A. Auge, Logan K. Blair, Liana T. Burghardt, Jennifer Coughlan, Brianne Edwards, Lindsay D. Leverett, Kathleen Donohue, 2015, Seed Science Research on p. 230-246

Evolving together, evolving apart: measuring the fitness of rhizobial bacteria in and out of symbiosis with leguminous plants

Liana T. Burghardt, 2020, New Phytologist on p. 28-34

Transcriptomic basis of genome by genome variation in a legume-rhizobia mutualism

Liana T. Burghardt, Joseph Guhlin, Chan Lan Chun, Junqi Liu, Michael J. Sadowsky, Robert M. Stupar, Nevin D. Young, Peter Tiffin, 2017, Molecular Ecology on p. 6122-6135

Fluctuating, warm temperatures decrease the effect of a key floral repressor on flowering time in Arabidopsis thaliana

Liana T. Burghardt, Daniel E. Runcie, Amity M. Wilczek, Martha D. Cooper, Judith L. Roe, Stephen M. Welch, Johanna Schmitt, 2016, New Phytologist on p. 564-576

News Articles Featuring Liana Burghardt

Sep 29, 2023

Liana Burghardt named new Director of Center for Root and Rhizosphere Biology

Assistant Professor of Plant Science Liana Burghardt is serving as the new Director of the Center for Root and Rhizosphere Biology, replacing outgoing director Jonathan Lynch, distinguished professor of plant nutrition.

Full Article

Aug 22, 2023

One Health Microbiome Center's 2023-24 Interdisciplinary Innovation Fellows

The One Health Microbiome Center (OHMC) in the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences at Penn State has named five recipients for its 2023-24 Interdisciplinary Innovation Fellowships (IIF) program.

Full Article

Aug 21, 2023

Cover crops project provides fertile ground for USDA graduate fellows

Penn State College of Agricultural Sciences graduate students received more predoctoral fellowships from the U.S. Department of Agriculture than any other institution over the last five years.

Full Article

Dec 22, 2022

2022 Top 10 Most Popular Microbiome Center News Articles

The stories that made the year in 2022 for the Penn State Microbiome Center

Full Article

Apr 28, 2022

New plant science team gets grants from USDA-NIFA for research on soil microbes

An assistant professor in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences has received $950,000 in two competitive grants from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to lead a team studying interactions between plants and rhizobial soil bacteria, with the long-term goal of boosting forage and crop production while reducing environmental impacts of fertilizer use.

Full Article

Sep 16, 2020

Liana Burghardt awarded Tansley Medal for excellence in plant science

Assistant Professor of Plant Science recognized for outstanding research contributions early in her career.

Full Article