We study molecular ecology, phylogenetics, conservation genetics, and metagenomic community analyses of fungi primarily, but also bacteria, and plants including studies on orchid fungi, mycoheterotrophic (nonphotosynthetic) plants, wild rice conservation genetics, and native and invasive Phragmites australis. My previous research projects have included phylogenetic and population genetics studies of several ectomycorrhizal fungal species including Rhizopogon and Tricholoma populinum. I have also studied genetic diversity in populations of Aspergillus flavus. Please check out the RESEARCH tab for information on current projects and the PUBLICATIONS tab for peer-reviewed publications from current and previous research projects.
The latest lab news is listed below.
June 2021
Former undergraduate research student Makayla Swain is featured in a recent CBC video. Makayla is currently finishing a MS degree at Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador in Canada. She is investigating the effect of nonnative moose on the forest ecosystem by studying the impact of moose poop in soil.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-labrador/moose-poop-1.6040762
May 2021
Environmental Science and Policy graduate student Jacob Pelegrin finished his thesis and graduated. Congratulations to Jacob!
May 2020
Former undergraduate lab researcher Autumn Ruleau will start law school at the University of Wisconsin Madison fall term!
Natasha Clark presented a poster on her wild rice chloroplast haplotype study at the virtual UW Green Bay Undergraduate Academic Excellence Symposium. She was awarded an honorable mention for the Sagar Award for Scientific Writing for her poster.
June 2019
Natasha Clark (BS Biology anticipated May 2020) was awarded an Heirloom Plant Research Grant to study Molecular Characterization of Wild Rice Populations in Northeastern Wisconsin.
May 2019
Jason Miller (ES&P graduate student) is awarded a Cofrin Research Grant to study Genetic Diversity of Corallorhiza and Cypripedium at Toft Point and the Ridges Sanctuary in Door County, Wisconsin.
Jacob Pelegrin (ES&P graduate student) is awarded and Cofrin Research Grant to study Mapping the links between ectomycorrhizal fungi and eastern white pine in northern Wisconsin
Lots of students graduate! Goodbye and best wishes to Rebecca Malcore, Maddie Quamme, Jennifer Bahling, and Makayla Swain. Rebecca has started a Ph.D. program at the University of Michigan. Makayla will start a MS program studying climate change effects on forest ecosystems at the Memorial University of Newfoundland, St John’s, Canada.
April 2019
Makayla Swain presented a poster on her coralroot research at the 18th University of Wisconsin Undergraduate Research Symposium (URSCA) just so happened to be held at UW Green Bay this year!
Rebecca Malcore presented a poster on her Phragmites australis research at the 18th University of Wisconsin Undergraduate Research Symposium (URSCA). For the poster she presented at this symposium, she was awarded the Sager Scholarship for Scientific Writing.
Rebecca Malc
ore was invited to present a poster on her Phragmites australis research at the 16th Annual University of Wisconsin System Research in the Rotunda, Madison, WI.
January 2019
Maddison Quamme, Jennifer Bahling, and Megan Richter join the lab. They will work on the Phragmites australis soil microbiome project.
December 2018
Autumn graduates. Congratulations and good luck with your future career!
Check out the you-tube page for the Cofrin Center for Biodiversity. Rebecca and Makayla are featured in this video:
Summer 2018 Cofrin Center for Biodiversity Research
September 2018 Autumn Ruleau joins the lab. She’ll work on the agriculture soil microbiome project.
June – July 2018 Summer field and lab work
Becca isolating pelotons from orchid roots.
Becca and Makayla conducting research on coral root orchids in Door County, Wisconsin.
June 2018 Katie successfully defended her thesis research! Congratulations!
June 2018 Rebecca was awarded the Friends of Peninsula State Park Student Research Grant to study yellow lady slipper orchids.
May 2018 Two students are awarded Cofrin Center for Biodiversity grants: Rebecca will study the fungi associated with coral root orchids at Toft Point. Makayla Swain will study genetic diversity of the coral root orchids.
Both Lydia and Kathi graduate. Congratulations!
April 2018 Three students presented posters at the at the University of Wisconsin Undergraduate Research Symposium (URSCA) held at UW Green Bay this year:
Rebecca presents a poster: Genetic Analysis of Phragmites australis leaf Samples to Determine the Presence of Native or Exotic Haplotypes.
Lydia Deweese presented a poster Bacterial community composition across varied agriculture techniques.
Kathi Arnold presented a poster: Genetic Analysis of Northern Wild Rice (Zizania palustris) Varieties in the Bay of Green Bay.
Great job, congratulations, Ladies!
January 2018 Becca is awarded a Ganga and Elizabeth Nair Endowed Scholarship for Natural Sciences. The Natural and Applied Sciences Departmental scholarships will be awarded at a ceremony in April. Congratulations, Becca!
November 2017 Two undergraduate students were awarded Heirloom Plant Undergraduate Research Grants.
Rebecca Malcore is going to examine the Phragmites plants found on the DNR Phragmites Adaptive Management Grant. She is using chloroplast sequences to determine what haploptypes of native and exotic Phragmites are present in Green Bay wetlands.
Kathi Arnold (just joined the lab) will use DNA sequencing to determine haplotypes of wild rice populations in wetlands along Green Bay.
October 2017 Rebecca Malcore (Junior Biology, Human Biology) has joined the lab. She is working on the Phragmites australis soil microbial community study. She will take charge of the molecular biology part of the study. Welcome Becca!
September 7-10, 2017 Lisa Grubisha gave an invited presentation on conservation genetic studies of pinedrops (Pterospora andromedea) and ectomycorrhizal Rhizopogon symbionts at the North American Mycological Association (NAMA) annual meeting that was held this year outside Cable, Wisconsin.
While at NAMA, Lisa runs into an old friend from Corvallis, Oregon. Lisa completed her Master of Science degree at Oregon State University in Corvallis.
August and September 2017 As part of the study by Bobby Webster and Dr. Robert Howe, we are investigating the effects of treatment of invasive Phragmites australis on the soil microbial community. This summer we began field collections with a team of Cofrin Center of Biodiversity student researchers.
June 1, 2017 to present Lydia Deweese (Senior, Human Biology) and Zachary Gates (Junior, Biology) have joined the lab to participate in summer research experiences for undergraduates. They collected a lot of soil, processed the soil, isolated DNA, amplified 16S and ITS DNA for bacteria and fungi, respectively.
Zachary worked on collecting, processing, and isolating soil microbial DNA from the corn treatments at WICST.
May 30, 2017 I have posted a tutorial for analyzing Illumina sequence (ITS, 16S), run by the University of Wisconsin Biotechnology Center, using the Qiime pipeline in the Research tab. This tutorial was put together by Samantha Nellis (ES&P graduate Dec 2016) and Josh Moyer (graduated May 2017, Biology).
May 13, 2017 Congratulations to undergraduates Joshua Moyers (Biology: Cell and Molecular Biology emphasis) and Phillip Malchek (Biology: Ecology and Conservation Biology) who graduated from the University of Wisconsin – Green Bay today!
April 2017 We have received two years of funding as part of a Wisconsin DNR funded grant from the Cofrin Center for Biodiversity to study microbial communities associated with Phragmites australis! Students (graduate and undergraduate) interested in working on this project should contact Lisa Grubisha directly (grubishl@uwgb.edu)
April 2017 We have received two-years of funding to continue our orchid conservation work at the Ridges Sanctuary!
March 16, 2017 Congratulations to collaborator PhD candidate Nick Dowe (University of Wyoming) on his latest publication in Mycologia, “Increased phylogenetic resolution within the ecologically important Rhizopogon subgenus Amylopogon using 10 anonymous nuclear loci”. The article may be viewed here.
February 6, 2017 Congratulations to collaborator PhD candidate Nick Dowe (University of Wyoming) on his latest publication in Conservation Genetic Resources (online early), “Development of Anonymous Nuclear Loci for Pterospora andromedea (Monotropoideae) Using Illumina and Ion Torrent Sequencing Data” may be viewed here.
February 1, 2017 Senior Philip Malchek (Biology: Ecology and Conservation Biology) joined the lab. This semester he will be studying fungal biodiversity of Northeast Wisconsin with graduate student Katie McDonald.
January 27, 2017 Former undergraduate researcher, Angela Grimm, was awarded the Morgan and Macaluso Family Endowed Scholarship at the Dept. of Natural & Applied Sciences 2016-17 Scholarship Awards Ceremony! Congratulations, Angela! Additional information about the awards ceremony may be found at the Log.
December 9, 2016 Samantha Nellis successfully defended her MS thesis research! Congratulations, Samantha!
Sept. 17-18, 2016 Lisa Grubisha and graduate students Samantha Nellis and Katie McDonald attended the annual Alexander Smith Foray hosted this year by the University of Michigan at the UM Biological Station in Pellston, MI. Guest speaker Rytas Vilgalys (Duke University) captured the event in photographs here.
Sept. 1, 2016 New record of a Hymenogaster species found at Kingfisher Farm! This species has since been collected at the Cofrin Arboretum as well. 
August 8, 2016 Graduate student Samantha Nellis presents a poster on her thesis research at the 84th Mycological Society of America annual meeting held at the University of California Berkeley, August 7-11, 2016. ,
August 7, 2016 Assistant Professor Lisa Grubisha, graduate student Samantha Nellis and Biology (Cell & Molecular Biology emphasis) senior Joshua Moyer are thanked in the 84th Mycological Society of America annual meeting program for their participation in organizing poster and contributed presentation sessions with fellow Wisconsinites Dr. Anne Pringle and Ph.D. student Jacob Golan which required reading all 340 abstracts!
August 8-10, 2016 Senior Bob Walker spent three days at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC) working with SERC Deputy Director Dr. Dennis Whigham and Jay O’Neill learning techniques to isolate mycorrhizal fungal symbionts from orchid roots.
August 1-4, 2016 Assistant Professor Lisa Grubisha attends the Mycological Society of America’s pre-conference field trip on Sierra Nevada hypogeous fungi held at Huntington Lake, CA. The trip was recorded in photographs by Rytas Vilgalys (Duke University) here (you’ll need to scroll down to find it).
July 29, 2016 Bob Walker explains how his research is part of the orchid conservation and restoration project at the Ridges Sanctuary in Door County, Wisconsin, to University of Wisconsin – Green Bay Chancellor Gary Miller. Check out UW – Green Bay Log coverage of this trip.
May 5, 2016 Congratulations to Katie McDonald, MS student at UW Green Bay! Katie has been awarded a Graduate Research Grant by the UWGB Office of Graduate Studies. This funding will support Katie’s thesis research efforts in documenting macrofungal diversity at two of the Cofrin Center for Biodiversity Natural Areas: Peninsula Sanctuary (Door County) and Kingfisher Farm (Manitowoc County).
April 2016 Congratulations to collaborator Nick Dowie, PhD student at the University of Wyoming, on his recent publication in Fungal Ecology (20: 97-107)! This study is part of his dissertation research on the phylogeography and host-specificity of the mycoheterotrophic plant pinedrops, Pterospora andromedea, and fungal hosts, Rhizopogon subgenus Amylopogon species. See the complete citation under Publications.
April 2016 Congratulations to collaborator Alejandro Ortega-Beltran on his recent publication in Journal of Applied Microbiology (120: 986-998)! This paper was part of his PhD research on Aspergillus flavus populations in Mexico at the University of Arizona. See the complete citation under Publications.
February 2016 Congratulations to Samantha Nellis, MS student at UW Green Bay! She was recently awarded a Graduate Student Research Grant by the UWGB Office of Graduate Studies. This award will provide funding for her research on nectar-dwelling microbial communities in NE Wisconsin. Way to go, Samantha!