Advisory Board and Editors Microbiology
Daniel Fischer
I studied Statistics and Computer Sciences at the Technical University of Dortmund, Germany. During that time, my interest was particularly in mathematical statistics with a focus on high-dimensional extensions of the univariate median. After graduating, I moved to Tampere, Finland and completed my PhD in at the University of Tampere in Biostatistics with minor Bioinformatics.
While still being enrolled as PhD student at the University I started to work as a researcher in Bioinformatics at the MTT, Jokioinen, Finland. Since 2015 I am working at the Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke) where I finalized my PhD.
My published articles in peer-reviewed journals cover a wide range of applications as well as statistical theory. My areas of expertise are target gene detection, biomarker identification and novel gene detection with a special focus on long non-coding RNAs. Further, I have experiences in the development of statistical methods for DE testing as well as deriving novel non-parametrical tests for (e)QTL analyses. I published and maintain currently six R-packages, i.e. for (e)QTL testing, cross-species ortholog detection and dimension reduction methods.
Suzanne M.J. Fleiszig
Professor, University of California, Berkeley. Programs in Optometry, Vision Science, Infectious Disease and Immunity, and Microbiology. Vice President, Tear Film and Ocular Surface Society. Former President, International Society for Contact Lens Research. Councillor, American Society for Microbiology. Recipient of the 2005 Glenn A. Fry Award and the 2010 Korb Award. Editorial Boards: PLoS ONE, Infection & Immunity, and Investigative Ophthalmology & Vision Science.
Mario Alberto Flores-Valdez
Dr. Mario Alberto Flores-Valdez is a Professor in the Medical and Pharmaceutical Biotechnology Unit, CIATEJ, A.C., Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico (2007-present). He is a member of the National System of Researchers (SNI), and a member of the Mexican Academy of Sciences. He was a Stanford University Medical Center postdoctoral fellow (2004-2007), where he received a Dean's Fellowship Award (2006) to conduct research on Tuberculosis. He worked in UNAM as Research Assistant for Prof. Jaime Mora (2004) and Prof. Emundo Calva (2003). He has received a Ph.D. in Biochemistry from UNAM (1999-2003), a M.Sc. in Molecular Biology and Genetic Engineering from UANL (1996-1999) and a B.Sc. from Universidad de Sonora (1991-1996) in Chemistry and Biology. He received fellowships from CONACYT for M.Sc. and Ph.D. studies and in M.Sc. and B.Sc. has received Diplomas as Best Student. He has expertise in Tuberculosis, particularly in developing recombinant BCG strains. He has been PI for 7 grants from 2008 to date, focused in studies about tuberculosis vaccine development and basic aspects of mycobacterial physiology.
Larry Forney
Dr. Larry Forney is a University Distinguished Professor and a member of the American Academy of Microbiology with academic appointments in the Department of Biological Sciences and Bioinformatics and Computational Biology at the University of Idaho. He is an evolutionary ecologist who conducts research on bacterial community ecology of the human microbiome and mutation-selection processes that govern the occurrence and persistence of genetic diversity in spatially structured environments.
M. Pilar Francino
M. P. Francino studied Biology at the National University of Mexico and obtained her Ph.D. at the University of Rochester (New York), working on analyses of rates and patterns of DNA sequence evolution in bacteria and primates. She conducted postdoctoral research in bacterial genetics as an EMBO Fellow at the University of Paris. After that, she served as a Research Scientist at the DOE Joint Genome Institute (JGI) for five years, and was Head of the JGI Evolutionary Genomics Program from 2007 to 2009. Since 2009, she is a Senior Scientist at the Genomics and Health Department of FISABIO-Public Health in Valencia, and has been Head of the Department since 2012. Her current research focuses on the metagenomic analysis of human microbiome communities, in particular on understanding the development of the gut microbiota in infants. Work in her group analyzes the taxonomic composition, coding capabilities and gene expression patterns of the gut microbial community at different stages during infancy, as well as the relationships of these features with infant health. In addition, she is also interested in understanding the forces that shape the structure, organization and evolution of genomes. In previous and current work, she has addressed genome and molecular evolution subjects at different scales, ranging from the impact of mutational biases during DNA sequence evolution, to the evolution of new genes and their regulatory regions and the coevolution of different genomic traits.
Bernardo Franco
Dr. Franco has 20 years experience in academic research in microbiology, molecular biology, and biochemistry. Skills acquired during academic research include mainly nucleic acid manipulation, synthetic biology, bioinformatics, PCR, RT-PCR and qPCR, protein purification and characterization, light and confocal microscopy, flow cytometry and cell sorting, microbiological techniques (microorganism and cell culture, and collection management), good laboratory practices among others. He has eight years teaching experience in undergraduate and graduate programs (Signal transduction in bacteria and Molecular biology techniques, respectively).
Anne Galinier
Leader team in the "Laboratoire de Chimie Bactérienne"
Research Director in the "Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique"
Review Editor of "Frontiers in Microbiology" specialty "Microbial Physiology and Metabolism"
Rodolfo García-Contreras
Dr. Rodolfo García-Contreras is a Professor and Microbiologist in the Department of Microbiology and Parasitology at The National Autonomous University of Mexico. He is interested in quorum sensing, quorum quenching virulence, bacterial resistance, and alternative treatments for bacterial infections and bacteriophages.
Suresh Gawande
Dr. Suresh Gawande is a Principal Scientist at ICAR-Directorate of Onion and Garlic Research, Pune, India. He obtained his Ph.D. from the Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi, India in the discipline of Plant Pathology. His areas of interest are genomics of biotic and abiotic stress, host-pathogen-vector interaction of tospoviruses, microbial metagenomics, plant-pathogen diagnostics, mechanism of genetic and induced host plant resistance. Currently, he is working on biotechnological approaches for biotic stress management.
Joseph J Gillespie
Dr. Gillespie is an evolutionary biologist with broad interests in organismal and molecular evolution. The major focus of his current research is deciphering the mechanisms by which obligate intracellular species of Rickettsiales (Alphaproteobacteria) invade, survive and replicate within eukaryotic cells.
In research funded by the National Institutes of Health, Dr. Gillespie utilizes phylogenetics, comparative genomics and bioinformatics to guide experimental research on various pathogenic species of Rickettsia and their associated arthropod vectors. His early research resulted in the reclassification of Rickettsia species and the identification of many lineage-specific pathogenicity factors. Through years of intense scrutinization of dozens of diverse rickettsial genomes, Dr. Gillespie and colleagues have described a large, dynamic mobilome for Rickettsia species, resulting in the identification of integrative conjugative elements as the vehicles for seeding Rickettsia genomes with many of the factors underlying obligate intracellular biology and pathogenesis. Via an iterative process of genome sequencing, phylogenomics, bioinformatics, and classical molecular biology and microbiology, Dr. Gillespie continues to lead and assist research projects on the characterization of rickettsial gene and protein function, as well as the description of cell envelope glycoconjugates.
Peter R Girguis
Peter Girguis joined the Harvard faculty as an assistant professor in 2005, becoming full professor in 2012. His research efforts are aimed at better understanding how microbes mediate matter and energy flow through Earth’s biosphere. He develops novel methods and technologies for studying microbially-mediated energy flow and harvesting, including laboratory and in situ incubators that better mimic environmental conditions, and field-deployable instruments such as underwater mass spectrometers, carbon isotope analyzers and high-performance hydrogen sensors that allow him to study microbial processes in the lab and in situ.
Girguis has authored or co-authored over 85 publications, including papers in Nature, Science, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and the Proceedings of the Royal Society. Girguis is a board member of the Ocean Exploration Trust (OET), is on Schmidt Ocean Institute vehicle advisory boards, and served as chair of the National Science Foundations’ Deep Submergence Science Committee (DeSSC).
Girguis’ honors include 5 consecutive years of commendations for distinguished teaching, the 2007 and 2011 Lindbergh Foundation Award for Science & Sustainability, a 2010 Honorable mention in the ENI International Energy and the Environment Award, a feature in the 2008 Discover Magazine’s “10 Everyday Technologies That Can Change the World” (bio-powered lights), and a 2008 Honorable Mention in the Buckminster Fuller Innovations in Science Award.
Mahesh Gokara
Dr. Mahesh Gokara is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Department of Cancer Biology at the Mayo Clinic. He has a Ph.D biochemistry with an experience of over 10 years in multidisciplinary research areas including biochemistry, biophysics and bioinformatics.