Deep-sea hydrothermal vents constitute important habitats to find new microbial solutions that are urgently needed in the bioprocessing industry, where the degradation of complex materials is often a major challenge. Therefore, this project deals with long-term in-situ enrichment approaches based on natural and synthetic substrates, indicating the responsible microorganisms and enzymes involved in the respective degradation processes. The main objectives of the proposed project are the targeted enrichment and cultivation of heterotrophic microorganisms from in-situ incubations based on different sorts of polymers and to determine the underlying processes of polymer degrading consortia. Using metagenomes and metatranscriptomes new enzymes for various industries will be discovered. Furthermore, the metabolic secrets and the capacity of the microbiomes of hydrothermal vents in the Arctic deep-sea will be revealed.
The student will maintain and take care of existing polymer degrading microbial enrichment cultures. Additionally the student will set up enrichment cultures using different cultivation conditions. The student will analysis these cultures using molecuar methods like DNA extraction, PCR and sequencing, but also by using fluorescence microscopy. Furthermore, excisting metagenomes have to be analyzed and new samples have to be prepared for amplicon and metagenomic sequencing.
Funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Neither the European Union nor EACEA can be held responsible for them.
