Tapahtumakalenteri

Dr. Gomez-Consarnau received her Ph.D. at Kalmar University in Sweden in 2009. Between 2010-2015 she conducted her post-doc studies at the ICM-CSIC Institute of Marine Sciences in Barcelona and at the University of Southern California, where she currently runs her own research group studying the functions of marine microbes and their ecological implications to marine environments. One of her primary interests has been rhodopsin phototrophy and its role in marine ecosystems. In her research, she combines culture-based studies and field samplings together with 'omics' and state-of-the-art analytical chemistry methods.  

Abstract: Sunlight drives virtually all life on the Earth's surface, with about 50% of primary productivity occurring in marine systems. However, before the year 2000, all phototrophy in the ocean was thought to rely only on chlorophyll-like molecules. This traditional view of phototrophy changed radically with the discovery of marine bacterial proteorhodopsins (PR). Since then, PR genes and transcripts have repeatedly been found in extremely high abundances in all sunlit environments, particularly in the surface ocean. PRs are simple light-driven proton pumps that allow microbes to transform light into chemical energy. Our lab combines physiology studies with (meta)-genomics, (meta)-transcriptomics, and environmental quantifications to try to understand the role of PR-based photoheterotrophy in the ocean. In this talk, I will show that the solar energy captured by PR-photoheterotrophy can promote bacterial growth, substrate uptake, and survival to starvation under organic matter limitation. I will further show how quantitative estimates of PR in different marine systems–ranging from coastal upwelling to HNLC areas–can help us understand their distribution patterns and the amounts of –previously unaccounted–energy entering the ocean's biosphere.    

Gomez-Consarnau research group 

 https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=QrGEAnIAAAAJ&hl=en   

Welcome to this exciting seminar!  

Eeva Eronen-Rasimus