Claudia Breitkreuz
Contact / Address
Claudia Breitkreuz
PhD Student
Department of Soil Ecology
Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ
Theodor-Lieser-Strasse 4 | D-06120 Halle/Saale
Germany
+49 345 558 5416
claudia.breitkreuz@ufz.de
Current Project
The title of my docotoral project is “Impact of plant growth promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR) on stress resistance of winter wheat”.
Global change is one of the major topics of our contemporary society. Climate models predict a decrease in summer precipitation and an increase in average annual temperatures. These changes in environmental conditions have severe consequences for the agricultural productivity in Germany. Taking in account existing data of the past years, yield losses were already recorded in combination with longer drought periods occurring in summer and spring months. The risks of yield loss will increase, especially in regions with soils characterized by low water retention capacities and nutrient availabilities. The negative effects on the agricultural productivity can be mitigated by so called plant growth promoting rhizobacteria. These bacteria provide a wide range of functional traits enabling them to support plants growth even under drought stress conditions. Until now, a lot of studies have been done in arid regions showing the positive effect of PGPR on agricultural productivity, but only a few studies exist for Germany.
In order to moderate the impact of climate change on agricultural systems my project addresses the microbial communities in the soils identifying important mechanisms in structural and functional diversity of the whole community and single species to increase resistance of agro-ecosystems in Germany to climate change. The main questions are how quickly and to what extent structural and/or functional adaptation of the microbial communities in the soil are going to happen and do these adaptations really reduce drought stress for wheat plants. I expect the communities to adapt to drought stress and further that these adapted communities reduce drought stress by improving nutritional supply for the plants. Furthermore, I expect that the microbial community responses differ among farming systems (conventional vs. organic), soil type (sandy soil vs. Chernozem) and wheat cultivar (drought tolerant vs. drought sensitive).
Investigating the impact of soil type, wheat cultivar, drought stress and land use systems on microbial communitites under field conditions (GCEF) and in a pot experiment
CV / Scientific Career
since 04/2016
PhD Student at the Department of Soil Ecology, UFZ Halle, Germany
Supervised by Prof. Dr. François Buscot, PD Dr. Mika Tarkka and Dr. Thomas Reitz
Fund by Deutsche Bundesstiftung Umwelt (DBU)
02/2015 - 03/2016
Research Assistant in the group of Dr. Thomas Reitz, Field Experimental Soil Ecology – GCEF, UFZ Halle, Germany
10/2012 - 03/2015
Core subject: “Biodiversity and Evolution: Plants”
Thesis title: “The impact of drought and plant communities on the functional diversity of the genus Pseudomonas"
10/2008 - 09/2012
Bachelor of Science in Biology, Leipzig University, Germany
Thesis title: “Vorstellung einer Methode zur Vermessung der Blattnervatur an herbarisierten Blättern”
Publications
Index:
You could use our publication index for further requests.
2023 (1)
- Sünnemann, M., Beugnon, R., Breitkreuz, C., Buscot, F., Cesarz, S., Jones, A., Lehmann, A., Lochner, A., Orgiazzi, A., Reitz, T., Rillig, M.C., Schädler, M., Smith, L.C., Zeuner, A., Guerra, C.A., Eisenhauer, N. (2023):
Climate change and cropland management compromise soil integrity and multifunctionality
Commun. Earth Environ. 4 , art. 394 10.1038/s43247-023-01047-2
2022 (3)
- Gebauer, L., Breitkreuz, C., Heintz-Buschart, A., Reitz, T., Buscot, F., Tarkka, M.T., Bouffaud, M.-L. (2022):
Water deficit history selects plant beneficial soil bacteria differently under conventional and organic farming
Front. Microbiol. 13 , art. 824437 10.3389/fmicb.2022.824437 - Karimi, E., Aliasgharzad, N., Esfandiari, E., Hassanpouraghdam, M.B., Neu, T.R., Buscot, F., Reitz, T., Breitkreuz, C., Tarkka, M.T. (2022):
Biofilm forming rhizobacteria affect the physiological and biochemical responses of wheat to drought
AMB Express 12 , art. 93 10.1186/s13568-022-01432-8 - Siles, J.A., Díaz-López, M., Vera, A., Eisenhauer, N., Guerra, C.A., Smith, L.C., Buscot, F., Reitz, T., Breitkreuz, C., van den Hoogen, J., Crowther, T.W., Orgiazzi, A., Kuzyakov, Y., Delgado-Baquerizo, M., Bastida, F. (2022):
Priming effects in soils across Europe
Glob. Change Biol. 28 (6), 2146 - 2157 10.1111/gcb.16062
2021 (5)
- Breitkreuz, C., Heintz-Buschart, A., Buscot, F., Wahdan, S.F.M., Tarkka, M., Reitz, T. (2021):
Can we estimate functionality of soil microbial communities from structure-derived predictions? A reality test in agricultural soils
Microbiol. Spectr. 9 (1), e00278-21 10.1128/Spectrum.00278-21 - Breitkreuz, C., Herzig, L., Buscot, F., Reitz, T., Tarkka, M. (2021):
Interactions between soil properties, agricultural management and cultivar type drive structural and functional adaptations of the wheat rhizosphere microbiome to drought
Environ. Microbiol. 23 (10), 5866 - 5882 10.1111/1462-2920.15607 - Breitkreuz, C., Reitz, T., Schulz, E., Tarkka, M.T. (2021):
Drought and plant community composition affect the metabolic and genotypic diversity of Pseudomonas strains in grassland soils
Microorganisms 9 (8), art. 1677 10.3390/microorganisms9081677 - Rasul, M., Yasmin, S., Yahya, A., Breitkreuz, C., Tarkka, M., Reitz, T. (2021):
The wheat growth-promoting traits of Ochrobactrum and Pantoea species, responsible for solubilization of different P sources, are ensured by genes encoding enzymes of multiple P-releasing pathways
Microbiol. Res. 246 , art. 126703 10.1016/j.micres.2021.126703 - Wahdan, S.F.M., Reitz, T., Heintz-Buschart, A., Schädler, M., Roscher, C., Breitkreuz, C., Schnabel, B., Purahong, W., Buscot, F. (2021):
Organic agricultural practice enhances arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis in correspondence to soil warming and altered precipitation patterns
Environ. Microbiol. 23 (10), 6163 - 6176 10.1111/1462-2920.15492
2020 (1)
- Breitkreuz, C., Buscot, F., Tarkka, M., Reitz, T. (2020):
Shifts between and among populations of wheat rhizosphere Pseudomonas, Streptomyces and Phyllobacterium suggest consistent phosphate mobilization at different wheat growth stages under abiotic stress
Front. Microbiol. 10 , art. 3109 10.3389/fmicb.2019.03109
Conference Contributions
Talks
Breitkreuz C., Buscot F., Tarkka M., Reitz T. (2017) Impact of Plant Growth Promoting Rhizobacteria (PGPR) on Stress Resistance of Winter Wheat. iDiv Annual Conference, Leipzig, Germany
Posters
Breitkreuz C., Buscot F., Tarkka M., Reitz T. (2017) Impact of Plant Growth Promoting Rhizobacteria (PGPR) on Stress Resistance of Winter Wheat. Ecology Across Borders: Joint Annual Meeting, Ghent, Belgium