Mentor(s)

Ying Zhang, Jason Vailionis & Cecile Cres, Cell & Molecular Biology, University of Rhode Island

Project Location

University of Rhode Island – Kingston

Project Description

The prevalence of microplastics is posing increasing concerns due to their negative impacts on ecosystems and human health. Microbial-based degradation of microplastics provides a potential solution to this problem, but applications of this approach are yet to be fully realized. The broad application of genomic approaches has led to identification of biomarkers related to degradation of microplastics in various microbiomes, leading to new understandings of how microplastics might be metabolized or cycled in different ecosystems. In the Narragansett Bay, microbial communities are known to have faced significant influx of microplastics over the past two decades. However, little is known about the molecular potentials of microplastic degradation among its microbiomes. In this project, we will address this problem by leveraging metagenomic data obtained from the free-living microbiome of the Narragansett Bay. Students will construct computational pipelines to establish an inventory of microplastic degrading genes encoded by the microbiome and study how the abundance of these genes may change over time-series of data.

This project involves computational work

Required/Preferred skills

Course preparation in microbiology, biochemistry, and/or microbial ecology. Prior experiences in computer programming, command-line operations, and/or high-performance computing are preferred but not required.

Will the project require transportation to field sites? No

Is this project open to Surf Flex? Yes

In which core facilities might student conduct research? RI Genomics & Sequencing Center, Marine Science Research Facility @ URI-GSO, RI Center for Nanoscience & Nanotechnology, Brown’s Center for Computation and Visualization

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