Research
Costantino Vetriani
Department of Biochemistry and Microbiology and Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences
Research in my laboratory is focused on:
i) the physiology, ecology and evolutionary relationships of deep-sea prokaryotes,
with an emphasis on deep-sea hydrothermal vents and cold seeps, and ii) the
microbial adaptations to extreme environmental conditions. More specifically,
we work on the isolation and characterization of novel organisms from deep-sea
environments, with an emphasis on thermophilic Archaea and Bacteria, and we
look at community dynamics along chemical and physical gradients at deep-sea
vents and cold seeps. Our experimental strategies include standard approaches
in marine microbiology, such as enrichment cultures/isolations, and molecular
ecological approaches, such as PCR, library construction and screening, sequencing,
DGGE, and FISH. Furthermore, in collaboration with biochemists, we use genetic
engineering and biochemical approaches, combined with comparative protein
structure modeling, to study the evolutionary adaptive features that allow
microorganisms to thrive in the extreme environmental conditions found in
the deep-sea (e.g., extremely high temperature found at deep-sea vents). We
believe that the integration of multiple approaches is critical to understand
the ecology and evolution of deep-sea microorganisms.
Funded Projects (Current and Past)
Memberships in Graduate Programs and Academic Departments at RU
