Single cell ecology

Otto X Cordero received a BS in Computer and Electrical Engineering from the Polytechnic University of Ecuador; an MSc in Artificial Intelligence from Utrecht University; and a PhD in Theoretical Biology also from Utrecht University. His main research focus is the ecology and evolution of natural microbial collectives. The Cordero lab is interested in understanding how social and ecological interactions at micro-scales impact the global productivity, stability and evolutionary dynamics of microbial ecosystems.

Stephen Quake is the Lee Otterson Professor of Bioengineering and Professor of Applied Physics at Stanford University and is co-President of the Chan Zuckerberg Biohub. He received a doctorate in Theoretical Physics from the University of Oxford in 1994. He began his faculty career at the California Institute of Technology in 1996, later becoming the Everhart Professor of Applied Physics and Physics. He joined Stanford in 2005 to help found and lead Stanford’s new Bioengineering department, cultivating it to nearly two dozen faculty members. He was simultaneously an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute from 2006-2016. Stephen has invented many measurement tools for biology, including new DNA sequencing technologies that have enabled rapid analysis of the human genome and microfluidic automation. Stephen is also well known for his work in the first non-invasive prenatal test for Down syndrome and other aneuploidies. His test is rapidly replacing risky invasive approaches such as amniocentesis, and millions of women each year now benefit from this approach. Honours include the Human Frontiers of Science Nakasone Prize, the MIT-Lemelson Prize, the Raymond and Beverly Sackler International Prize in Biophysics, the American Society for Microbiology Promega Biotechnology Research Award, the Royal Society of Chemistry Publishing Pioneer of Miniaturization Award, and the NIH Director’s Pioneer Award. He is an elected fellow of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, the National Academy of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Inventors, the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering and the American Physical Society.

David Weitz received his PhD in physics from Harvard University and then joined Exxon Research and Engineering Company, where he worked for nearly 18 years. He then became a professor of physics at the University of Pennsylvania and moved to Harvard at the end of the last millennium as professor of physics and applied physics. He leads a group studying soft matter science with a focus on materials science, biophysics and microfluidics. Several startup companies have come from his lab to commercialize research concepts.

Sarah Teichmann is interested in global principles of regulation of gene expression and protein complexes, specifically in the context of immunity. Sarah did her PhD at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, Cambridge, UK and was a Beit Memorial Fellow at University College London. She started her group at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in 2001. In 2013, she moved to the Wellcome Trust Genome Campus in Hinxton/Cambridge, jointly with the EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute (WTSI). In January 2016 she became Head of the Cellular Genetics Programme at the WTSI.  Sarah is an EMBO member and a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, and her work has been recognised by a number of prizes, including the Lister Prize, Biochemical Society Colworth Medal, Royal Society Crick Lecture, EMBO Gold Medal and the Mary Lyon Medal.

The aim of Stefano Pagliara research is to devise approaches for microbe isolation, growth, and characterisation, thus allowing to understand how microbial cells interact with their natural environment both as a community and as individual cells. Stefano Pagliara obtained his PhD in Nanoscience from the University of Salento (Italy) in 2010, where he introduced a new microfluidic technology embedding organic light polarisers. Afterwards, he joined the Cavendish Laboratory at the University of Cambridge where he advanced the understanding of molecular transport across biological membranes and discovered that the nuclei of embryonic stem cells can be auxetic. Since 2017 he has been a Senior Lecturer at the University of Exeter where his research group investigates the molecular mechanisms underlying drug uptake and tolerance to antibiotics in bacteria.

After studying the mechanism of action of antifungal natural products and their derivatives during her PhD in Microbiology at the Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen, Germany, Dr Tanja Woyke pursued her postdoctoral research at the JGI in 2004. The main objective of her research was the symbiont community of a gutless oligochaete for which she deciphered function and host-symbiont interplay using metagenomics. Taking on a Research Scientist position in 2007, she switched gears from metagenomics to single-cell genomics, which is now her primary interest and passion. Tanja stepped into the microbial genomics program lead position in 2009. She now holds a Staff Scientist position at the JGI, an Adjust Scientist position at the Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences and an Adjunct Associate Professor at the UC Merced School of Natural Sciences.

Dr Josep M Gasol is a Research Professor in Barcelona, interested in planktonic microbe abundance and activity, and their ecosystem effects, with emphasis on microorganism community structure (size, functional and taxonomical structure), and how the physical and biological factors shape it. He approaches these question by empirical analysis of data bases, oceanographic cruise, mesocosm and microcosm experiments, and by the combined use of image analysis and flow cytometry and metabolic fluorescent probes. Josep started his career working on the microbes of one of the most interesting lakes in the world, Lake Cisó. He was then a postdoc in Montreal where instead of focussing on one lake, he tried to study as many lakes as possible, and then started to focus on the Ocean. Josep is very involved with the Microbial Observatory of Blanes Bay, where he coordinates the long term research, was the Microbiology coordinator of the Malaspina-2010 circumnavigation, and he has recently edited the last edition of the Microbial Ecology of the Ocean book.

Patrick Keeling is a Canadian evolutionary microbiologist and Professor in Botany at the University of British Columbia. He grew up in rural Ontario, and completed a Bachelors at the University of Western Ontario in Genetics and a PhD in Biochemistry at Dalhousie, followed by postdoctoral research at the University of Melbourne and Indiana University. He began his current position as a professor at UBC in Vancouver in 1999.