Title: Microbial biogeochemistry of emerging contaminants and anthropogenic organic matter in the Atlantic and Southern Oceans
The predoctoral researcher Jon Iriarte, from the Global Change and Genomic Biogeochemistry group, will defend his thesis on 21st May at 10:30h at the Aula Magna Enric Casassas of the Faculty of Chemistry (University of Barcelona)
Directors: Maria Vila-Costa and Jordi Dachs
Thesis Committee: Barend L. van Drooge, Eva Ortega Retuerta and Marta Sebastián Caumel
Abstract:
This thesis investigates the effects of background levels of contaminants on marine microbes and their potential role in the biodegradation of these compounds, focusing on remote regions such as the Antarctic coast and the open ocean. To do so, it integrates chemical data with compositional and functional data of microbial communities, along with other physicochemical parameters obtained through field measurements and experiments conducted during various sampling campaigns. The resulting datasets were analyzed using data analysis tools, statistical tests, and bioinformatics software.
This thesis demonstrates that the simultaneous characterization of organic contaminants and microbial communities through field measurements provides new insight into the complexity of processes occurring under real environmental conditions. It reveals that background levels of organic contaminants, while not the main drivers, can significantly influence marine microbial communities. Furthermore, microbial degradation was observed to potentially act as an oceanic sink for emerging contaminants at the ocean surface.
