Unraveling the microbiology life in sediments from a small fjord in Antarctica

Nov 13, 2023, 13:15 Uhr

MARUM Seminar

MARUM seminar room 2070

Dr. Graciana Willis Poratti

Instituto Antártico Argentino (IAA) Campus Migueletes Universidad Nacional de San Martin, Buenos Aires, Argentina

I currently work as an Assistant Researcher of CONICET at Instituto Antártico Argentino. Since 2019 I have been cooperating with Prof. Dr. Michael Friedrich from UniBremen on the DFG funded project “Environmental Controls of Iron Reducing Microorganisms in Antarctic Sediments” (ECIMAS) and did three Potsdoc short research stays in UniBremen funded by DAAD. My working area of research involves marine microbiology and biogeochemistry. My focus is to study extreme microorganisms from Antarctica and other cold environments. I study how microorganisms can drive iron and sulfur cycles and how their ecophysiology is affected by glacial retreat and climate change. Also, I search for extreme microorganisms that might be useful for the biotechnology industry.

In this talk I will show some of our results regarding microorganisms living in sediments from Potter Cove, a small fjord located in South Shetland Island on the West Antarctic Peninsula, and how they can thrive under the constant environmental changes occurring in the WAP due to global warming.