Research By-Fellow Dr. Sarabeth Buckley is a US National Science Foundation (NSF) Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Biology and joined the University of Cambridge Department of Plant Sciences in 2020. Her area of expertise is in finding creative ways to enhance plant growth with a focus on molecular engineering and plant physiology. Dr. Buckley completed her Ph.D. as an NSF Graduate Research Fellow at Boston University in Boston, Massachusetts, USA while a Visiting Research Fellow at Harvard University. Her Ph.D. focused on enhancing growth in rooftop gardens using indoor air from exhaust vents on rooftops as well as engineering a strain of bacteria to produce a plant growth enhancing molecule that could substitute traditional fertilizers. Currently, her postdoctoral project focuses on understanding important growth enhancing relationships between soil microorganisms and plants, particularly mycorrhizae. She is studying one of the first stages of communication between mycorrhizae and rice and understanding the exchange of chemical signals. Many of Sarabeth’s projects have been very interdisciplinary and she has been tangentially and directly involved in the development of two different commercial efforts. Sarabeth also loves to go social dancing and create elaborately designed, often themed baked goods.
