University of Texas-led team awarded $15m grant for switchgrass biofuel research

A researcher at the University of Texas at Austin (UTA) will receive two grants totalling $15 million (€13.2 million) to study a native prairie grass, including how it can become a sustainable source of biofuel.

Tom Juenger, a professor of integrative biology, will lead scientists from multiple institutions — including federal agencies, universities, and the HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology — in researching switchgrass.

A five-year grant from the Department of Energy’s Office of Biological and Environmental Research will provide $11 million for the university and $4 million for partner institutions.

Additionally, the National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded a four-year grant of $4 million to Juenger and his team.

The researchers will collect and sequence the genes of hundreds of switchgrass samples to study how genes and a host of environmental factors — including the soil, bacterial communities that live on the plant and in the soil, weather, and the size and growth rate of each plant — affect the plant and its potential as a biofuel.

‘The study lets us ask the really classic nature-nurture question: how much of the variation in the plant traits are driven by genetics or the environment or the interaction between genes and the environment?’ Juenger says.

Understanding how different factors affect one another ultimately will provide insights into basic plant biology and allow scientists to identify ways to improve switchgrass as an alternative energy source.

Switchgrass is found in the tallgrass prairies across North America and can thrive in soils unsuitable for other crops, making it useful not only for livestock grazing and to prevent soil erosion, but as a potential biofuel.