Dr Xiufang Xin

Research Interests:
Plants in nature are in constant contact with microbes, including pathogens, mutualists and commensal microbes, during their life cycle. These microbial contacts could greatly influence important plant traits such as growth and disease resistance.
Xiufang’s group study plant-microbe-environment interactions, and work with the model system Arabidopsis thaliana-Pseudomonas syringae as well as the important crop species rice.

Research Areas:
• Plant-pathogen Interactions –Interplay between bacterial pathogenesis and plant immunity; plant immune system
• Environmental Regulation of Disease –Molecular basis of environmental influence on plant diseases
• Plant Microbiome –Principles governing the homeostasis of phyllosphere microbial community and the role of phyllosphere microbiome to plant fitness