Seaweeds as model holobionts to study host-microbe interactions
During my doctoral research, I studied microbiota associated with the seaweed Gracilaria vermiculophylla, an invasive species that spread around the northern hemisphere. Besides evaluating how its microbiota vary across the northern hemispere, we also simulated invasions in the lab to learn how microbiota change when their hosting organism is translocated to a new envrionment, and how this influences the chances of an introduced host to survive an introduction event and may become a succesful invader.

Unraveling the drivers of benthic microbial biogeography
Since August 2020, I am a postdoc in the Umbio group at the ICBM. Besides continuing research on seaweed holobionts, I study microbiota in marine sediments. Specifically, I evaluate how the benthic microbial biogeography of the North Sea is shaped by environmental variables such as sediment characteristics and temperature and in particular whether microbial biogeography is affected by bottom trawling, which is a destructive fishing practice. This postdoc is conducted within the joint research project MGF North Sea, which is part of the German Marine Research Alliance.