Research
Bioenergy Microbiome Research (2014-2015)
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, USA
As part of research involving the cellulose degrading Passalid beetle, I had a sub-project isolating single-strain colonies from the beetle’s gut. This project involved using an anaerobic chamber for growing bacteria, several molecular biotechnology methods (i.e. PCR, DNA extraction, purification), and standard microbiology techniques (i.e. sterilization, plating, single-carbon source plate preparation). The sequencing results revealed the isolation of several bacterial strains and one fungal strain involved in cellulose degradation in the beetle. Research in cellulose degradation is important for the development of viable bioenergy methods.
Biofuels Research (2013-2014)
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, USA
This project was a done as a Master’s degree project for Uppsala University. Dr Christer Jansson, head of the biofuels research group, was interested in whether I, using bioinformatics methods, could find any differences between the genomes of cyanobacteria that differ in their natural ability to synthesize alkanes. Being the main component of gasoline, alkanes are of high interest for biofuels production research. My project led to the identification of one protein that differs between the two groups.
Micobiome Research (2013)
Uppsala University, Sweden
Supervised by Dr Siv Andersson, I was hired to annotate and perform comparative genomics of 13 freshly sequenced bacterial strains found in the Honeybee hindgut. This work was entirely performed using bioinformatics methods, and included annotating for pseudo-genes and orthologs, and making statistical comparisons of the bacterial strains. The World Honeybee population is on a dangerous decline and this project aimed to elucidate the diversity of the microbial role in the Honeybee.
Extensive intra-phylotype diversity in lactobacilli and bifidobacteria from the honeybee gut.