Achievement

IGERT trainee Laura Camilleri spent seven weeks at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory with Dr. Trent Northen studying methanogen and sulfate reducing bacterial syntrophy in biofilm communities. The goal of Laura’s project was to inoculate deuterium into an established syntrophic biofilm co-culture of Desulfovibrio vulgaris and Methanococcus maripaludis to determine the metabolic profile of interacting members of the consortium. Metabolic flux measurements were made using stable isotope probing coupled with mass spectrometry. Microbial interaction between representatives of two foundational thermodynamic guilds establishes a significant link between the sulfur and carbon cycles, and represents an important contribution to Laura’s Ph.D. research project.