Rate My Professor Matthew Fields

Matthew Fields is a professor in the Department of Microbiology and Cell Biology at Montana State University, where he holds a position within the Biology faculty and serves as Director of the Center for Biofilm Engineering since 2015 and leader of the Biofilm Physiology & Ecology Team. His research specializes in environmental microbiology, with a focus on the physiology and ecology of environmental organisms and biofilms involved in nitrate contamination, heavy metal reduction, metal corrosion, extremophiles, and bio-energy. Fields examines relationships between biotic and abiotic factors that control microbial physiology, growth modes, signal sensing, and metabolic optimization in monocultures and indigenous microbial communities, linking genomic content to phenotype and community-level contributions to stress and survival. Current projects include SRB biofilms, methanogenic biofilms, heavy-metal bioreduction, algal biofuels, and microbial community dynamics.

Fields earned his Ph.D. in Microbiology (minor Biochemistry/Biological Engineering) from Cornell University in 2001, M.S. in Biological Sciences from Mississippi State University in 1995, and B.S. in Biology/Chemistry from Western Kentucky University in 1993. His career trajectory includes Assistant Professor at Miami University (2003-2006), Research Staff Scientist and Postdoctoral Research Associate at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (2001-2003), and at Montana State University as Assistant Professor (2007-2011), Associate Professor (2011 onward), and Professor. He has received the Provost's Award for Graduate Research/Creativity Mentoring (2017), Wiley Faculty Award for Meritorious Research (2011), MSU Award of Excellence (2010), Center for Biofilm Engineering Faculty Research Award (2009), and participated in the ASM Branch Lectureship Program (2009-2011); nominated for Faculty Collegiality Award (2014). Fields serves on the U.S. Department of Energy's Biological and Environmental Research Advisory Committee, as Specialty Editor for Frontiers in Microbiology - Microbiotechnology, Ecotoxicology & Bioremediation (2011-present), and Editorial Board of Applied and Environmental Microbiology (2006-present). Key publications include "Microbial diversity in water and sediment of Lake Chaka, an athalassohaline lake in northwestern China" (Applied and Environmental Microbiology, 2006), "Metagenomic insights into evolution of a heavy metal-contaminated groundwater microbial community" (The ISME Journal, 2010), "Engineering microbial consortia for controllable outputs" (The ISME Journal, 2016), and "Small and mighty: adaptation of superphylum Patescibacteria to groundwater environment drives their genome simplicity" (Microbiome, 2020). His leadership advances global biofilm research impacts.