Sauer Lab, Microbial metabolism, Metabolomics
A systems-level investigation of the stress-induced global metabolic adaptations in several organisms
Background
Microorganisms in their natural habitats are frequently challenged by rapidly changing environmental conditions. Desiccation in biofilms, nutrient bursts in the gut of host organisms, antimicrobial agents, oxidative milieus, temperature fluctuations or harmful radiation create stress situations with which microorganisms have to efficiently cope in order to survive. The response of microorganism to these stresses is triggered by cascades of general and stressor-specific signaling events that ultimately lead to an adaptation of the cellular phenotype, enabling survival. Because the response to these stresses frequently involves changes in metabolite levels, understanding the underlying metabolic rearrangements is necessary for a global picture of stress response mechanisms. Up to date, however, studies that investigate and compare the global metabolic response of different organisms to diverse stresses are missing, obscuring an unbiased systems perspective on stress response.
Your project
In your project, you will cultivate several organisms, including mammalian cells, in presence of different levels of various stressors and subsequently analyze their metabolome composition using a non-targeted mass spectrometry platform recently developed by our lab. During your stay, you will learn the basics of general lab work, different biochemical assays, fluorescence microscopy, state-of-the-art mass spectrometry and large-scale data analysis using Matlab. The data you will have obtained will allow you to discover similarities and differences between how different organisms cope with different stresses. Furthermore, you will learn how to interpret these results in a systems context and how to derive scientific hypotheses that you will test in follow-up experiments you will design.
Requirements
No previous skills in the lab or with Matlab are required.