What fascinates me about the microbiome is its role as a sentinel of environmental change. Species are experiencing rapid shifts from climate change, habitat alteration, and defaunation, and the microbiome provides a  lens to understand how organisms are responding to these large-scale pressures.Because microbiome shifts can have functional consequences for hosts, my work investigates how they respond to microclimate, seasonal cycles, and the loss of animal species to disentangle natural variation from environmentally driven change.

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This raises several key questions:

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• How do microbiomes respond to seasonal and climatic variation?

• Do species with similar functional traits show parallel microbiome responses to environmental shifts?

• What are the functional consequences of these microbiome changes for hosts and ecosystems?

 

To address these questions, I work across a wide range of species, including barnacles, rodents, and a semi-domesticated ruminant known as the mithun.​

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Select publication

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1. Brown BRP, Nunez JCB, Rand D. 2020. Characterizing the cirri and gut microbiomes of the intertidal barnacle Semibalanus balanoides. BMC Animal Microbiomem

2. Brown BRP, Kasoha LM, Lokeny P, Jakopak, RP, Dyck M, Wambua A, Reed CG, Newsome SD, Palmer TM, Pringle RM, Goheen JR, Kartzinel TR. 2024. Spatiotemporal variation in the gut microbiomes of co-occurring wild rodent species. Ecosphere 10.1002/ecs2.4854e. 10.1186/s42523-020-00058-0

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In prep. 

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1.     Geng Y**, Brown BRPB** [et al] Signatures of the Wild: Seasonal covariation of Microbiome and Diet in the mountain roaming Semi-Domesticated Bos frontalis Complete draft for Nature Communication

2.     Brown BRP, Goheen JR, Newsome SD, Pringle RM, Palmer TM, Khasoha LM, Kartzinel TR. Defaunation and the microbiome. Complete draft for Currently Biology.

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