Research Projects

PI in the following third-party funded research projects
(please follow the links for further information):

Project: CONCENTRATE - Carbon sequestration at Å resolution.
Funding: Transregional Collaborative Research Centre (TRR) 420 of the German Research Foundation (DFG)
Duration: 4 yrs (first phase started in Oct. 2025)
Goals: Unraveling the role of marine bacteria in the sequestration of glycans produced by marine microalgae from a ecosystems macro-scale down to protein structures and functions at atom resolution.

Project: POMPU - Proteogenomics of Marine Polysaccharide Utilization.
Funding: German Research Foundation (DFG)
Duration: ~8 yrs (unitl 2024)
Goals: (i) Establishing temporal dynamics of marine microbial polysaccharide degraders during algal blooms, (ii) Identifying proteins that drive marine polysaccharide turnover using environmental (meta)genomics, transcriptomics and proteomics, (iii) Testing computationally derived hypotheses regarding microbe and protein functions with targeted physiological and biochemical experiments.

Project: COGITO - Coastal Microbe Genomic and Taxonomic Observatory
Funding: DOE Joint Genome Institute (Community Sequencing Program)
Duration: ~2 yrs (until 2014; finalized in autumn 2015)
Goals: This project focuses on the role of marine bacterioplankton in carbon sequestration during algal blooms, with an emphasis on carbohydrates. Sequencing efforts will comprise up to 50 draft genomes, up to 50 single cell amplified genomes, 15 metagenomes and 300 points in time of 16S rRNA gene tag sequencing. These data will be interrelated with CARD-FISH-based biodiversity assessments and metaproteome data. The project aims at a high-resolution picture on biodiversity and functions.

Project: MAMBA - Marine Metagenomics for New Biotechnological Applications
Funding: European Union (7th Framework Program)
Duration: 4 yrs (until mid 2013)
Goals:This international project focuses on deepening our understanding of marine microbes in extreme habitats such as deep-sea hypersaline anoxic lakes, deep-sea hydrothermal vents and oil-polluted sites. Genomes, metagenomes and genomic libraries from these sites are screened for new microbial activities, in particular for targeted production of fine chemicals, antioxidants and anti-cancer drugs.

Project: MIMAS - Microbial Interactions in Marine Systems
Funding: German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF)
Duration: 3.5 yrs (until end of 2012)
Goal: This large-scale German project focuses on marine bacterioplankton in the German Bight with a focus on the bacterial role in carbon sequestration during algal blooms. Methods include CARD-FISH biodiversity assessments, metagenomics, metaproteomics, metatranscriptomics, 16S rRNA gene tag sequencing, ocean drift modeling and physicochemical parameter measurements.