Alexander Arkhipov

Soil bacteria provide significant benefits to plants by increasing nutrient uptake and defense against diseases. My current research focuses on the use of natural bioactive compounds isolated from specific soil bacteria as biopesticides for improving crop plants resistance against destructive fungi and oomycetes.
My future work will involve microbiome engineering and selecting microbiome-optimized plants. New approach of "microbiome breeding" will be used for a number of crop plants in natural soils by continuously selecting those plant-associated microbiomes that stimulate plant growth the most. Outputs from this project include customized, more stable plant-microbe interactions, breeding of crop-optimized microbiomes and selection of microbe-optimized cultivars. The expected outcomes will further advance our knowledge in beneficial plant-microbiome interactions leading to significant increases in the crop productivity and improvements in plants tolerance against abiotic and biotic stresses, thus making a beneficial contribution in global food security.