Spring 2027

Plant Microbiomes

Explores plant-associated microbial communities, study methods, and applications for improving plant and ecosystem health in agricultural and natural systems.

offering recorded4 credits
Recorded instructors · Spring 2027 Richard Lankau3.8/5

Summary

1 / 3

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2024: 3.56 GPA, 75.6% A/AB (n=41 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.83 GPA, 96.3% A/AB (n=27 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.76 GPA, 88.1% A/AB (n=42 letter grades).

What you’ll be able to do

  • Describe the major members of plant microbiomes and their functions.

  • Compare and contrast current and past approaches to studying plant microbiomes.

  • Use evidence to critically evaluate claims and test hypotheses.

  • Propose potential ways in which plant microbiomes may be utilized or manipulated to achieve societal goals.

  • Perform laboratory, bioinformatic and statistical protocols to characterize microbiome composition.

  • Propose, test, and interpret hypothesis about the structure of root associated microbial communities.

  • Evaluate scientific literature related to plant microbiomes and situate research results in the context of current literature.

Source: UW Guide

Grade history

↗
average GPA
letter grades
A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

All recorded terms · compare terms & instructors

Prerequisites

Course map

(ZOOLOGY/​BIOLOGY/​BOTANY 152,ZOOLOGY/​BIOLOGY 101 and 102,BOTANY/​BIOLOGY 130, or BIOCORE 381) and (STAT 301 or 371), or Graduate/professional standing

PLPATH 315

This is a best-effort interpretation; check the catalog requirements above.

Prerequisite text tree

Professors

Spring 2027
Adjusted rating
RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 5.00/5 from 2 quality ratings. The adjusted rating blends this with the UW review average (3.66/5), weighted as 20 additional ratings. Smaller samples stay closer to that average. Each captured review is counted once in the prior; this does not correct who chooses to leave a review.

RMP profile ↗ · All captured review dates; profile matched by name.

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2024: 3.56 GPA, 75.6% A/AB (n=41 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.83 GPA, 96.3% A/AB (n=27 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.76 GPA, 88.1% A/AB (n=42 letter grades).

Historical instructors & teaching patterns

RICHARD LANKAU is recorded teaching in Spring 2019, Spring 2020, Spring 2022, Spring 2023, Spring 2024, Spring 2025, Spring 2026. Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Recorded history may be incomplete and does not establish a future schedule.

Calendar & sections

Spring 2027

Schedule loads here as you scroll.

SectionModeEnrolled / capacityWaitlist
LAB 301Classroom Instruction0 / 260
LEC 001Classroom Instruction0 / 540
LAB 302Classroom Instruction0 / 260

Times are Central. Select a meeting for details; export includes recorded dates for the selected sections. Enrollment reflects scan time.

Meeting source records
Download part 1

Student experience

the class

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2024: 3.56 GPA, 75.6% A/AB (n=41 letter grades); Spring 2025: 3.83 GPA, 96.3% A/AB (n=27 letter grades); Spring 2026: 3.76 GPA, 88.1% A/AB (n=42 letter grades).

difficulty & workload

No workload feedback recorded.

Topics

  • Annual crop, grassland, and forested ecosystems
  • Major members of plant microbiomes and their functions
  • Molecular, bioinformatic, and statistical approaches to characterize rhizosphere microbiomes

Skills

  • Laboratory, bioinformatic, and statistical protocols for characterizing microbiome composition
  • Critical evaluation of claims and hypothesis testing using evidence
  • Evaluation of scientific literature and contextualization of research results

Grades

Latest available · Spring 2026— not enough history to project Spring 2027.

average GPA
A / AB grades
letter grades
Instructor

Grade distribution · % of letter grades

A
AB
B
BC
C
D
F

Grades over time

Through Spring 2026

More grade details Grade mix, volume & source data

Where this course fits relative to

Latest available grades · Spring 2026 · all course levels

GPA

Higher than % of other courses in this group.

Course GPAs · red marks this course’s range

letter grades

More recorded grades than % of other courses in this group.

Typical course in this group: letter grades.

About this comparison

1280 courses over the same term, each with at least 30 recorded letter grades. Cross-listed courses count once. GPA is not a measure of difficulty or teaching quality. The typical course is the median by recorded grade count; tied values are not counted as lower. Grade counts describe course scale, not unique students or typical section size.

Descriptions compare GPA with this group’s average: at least 0.20 higher or lower; otherwise close to average. Section size uses median recorded enrollment: small up to 30, mid-sized 31–99, large 100+. Lectures and discussion/lab sections are described separately.

Sources & history

UW–Madison

Catalog & offerings

Descriptions, prerequisites, and recorded course offerings.

Catalog observation history

Observations at scan time; dates do not imply when a catalog change took effect.

Download part 1
Selected offering source records
PLPATH 315 · Spring 2027

Plant Microbiomes

Recorded 2026-10-14
Raw records 
[
  {
    "run_id": "20261014T203208-0851c9a1",
    "semester": "1274",
    "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00",
    "offering_id": "1274:766:025047",
    "course_id": "PLPATH 315",
    "course_uid": "course_bdda16fb1e867316fda3ca75",
    "term_id": "1274",
    "source_course_id": "025047",
    "source_subject_id": "766",
    "title": "Plant Microbiomes",
    "credits_min": 4,
    "credits_max": 4,
    "typically_offered": "Spring"
  }
]
Rate My Professors

Student reviews

Original comments behind the course and instructor summaries.

Read original reviews

No records available.

Madgrades

Grade history

Recorded grade distributions by term, section, and instructor.

Explore recorded grades
Dataset & model

Recorded 2026-10-14

View the dataset on Hugging Face
Model outputs & technical records
Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B
LLM outputs across runs
Download part 1
Full model traces

Recorded model configuration, reasoning, and tool conversations.

Download part 1
Model & dataset provenance 
{
  "model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
  "model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
  "task_version": "17",
  "output_id": "c680762195a543f09bf1be82e8bba5b82b6be54cc0de46a45a506e2fd77a5e49",
  "requirements_status": "needs_review",
  "dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
  "observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}