Studying coral reefs on Australia’s Lizard Island
Microbiology PhD student Ryan McMinds joined Rebecca Vega Thurber’s lab in 2012. Many of the lab’s projects focus on pathogenic viruses and bacteria, but Ryan is more interested in the coral microbiome. He is searching for the microbes that are good for their hosts. That information makes the researchers’ current descriptions of stressor-induced microbiome shifts even more relevant.
So Ryan is in Australia to explore a more detailed description of the ‘normal’ coral microbiota. For more details, check out his blog from early July.
After arriving in Australia in late June, Ryan spent his first few weeks in Townsville, Australia, as a guest of Dr. David Bourne at the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS). The area between AIMS and nearby James Cook University (JCU) is one of the world’s premier centers for marine and coral reef science, and it’s chock full of leading researchers. He’s there to meet them while continuing his own studies.
