Science Focus Area: Oak Ridge National Laboratory
- Principal Investigator and Laboratory Research Manager: Paul E. Abraham1
- Scientific Co-Managers: Melissa Cregger1 and Joshua Michener1
- Co-Investigators: Daniel Jacobson1, David Kainer1, Jessy Labbé1, Wellington Muchero1, Xiaohan Yang1, Carrie Eckert2
- Participating Institutions: 1Oak Ridge National Laboratory; 2University of Colorado–Boulder
- Project Website: https://seed-sfa.ornl.gov
Summary

Ecosystem Engineering. The SEED SFA led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) focuses on ecosystem engineering to promote or limit microbial invasions. Natural microbial communities (black) face many potential microbial invaders (shown in green, blue, pink, and yellow). A successful invader must sequentially establish, spread, and produce a functional impact. Invaders have different traits (keys) that potentially allow them to proceed through barriers (locks) at each stage. By manipulating the invader (e.g., providing keys to an engineered strain) or the ecosystem (e.g., changing the locks at a given stage), an ecosystem engineer can control the outcome of potential invasions. In this example, the engineered strain (green) has the necessary traits to successfully deliver its payload and improve tree health while the undesired invaders (blue, pink, and yellow) are blocked. [Courtesy ORNL]
- Identify, quantify, and manipulate biotic and abiotic factors that alter the establishment of introduced genes, pathways, organisms, or communities in managed ecosystems.
- Investigate factors that influence the spread of genes, pathways, organisms, or communities through managed ecosystems.
- Quantify and manipulate the impact of a microbial invasion across space and time.