Her research focuses on quantifying the effects of global changes, including atmospheric pollution and species invasions and extinctions, on the outcome of species interactions in ecological communities. Her two primary areas of research include quantifying how global changes affect disease transmission and risk and control biodiversity and the functioning of ecosystems. Although her interests reach far beyond grasslands, much of her empirical work studying plants, insects, and disease is in grasslands. Since 2007, Borer has been lead-PI of the Nutrient Network, a global scientific cooperative of over 100 scientists performing identically replicated experiments at >75 sites in 17 countries on 6 continents to examine the joint effects of human changes to herbivores and fertilization on the world’s grasslands.