Alexander Hesselberg Løvestad
“Cellular development of Sphaeroforma arctica"
I am using single-cell transcriptomics on the Choanozoan Sphaeroforma arctica to find differences in gene expression between three cell morphologies as it goes through it’s life cycle. By finding out which genes S.arctica expresses during it’s life cycle we want to gain insight into which genes that were important for the evolutionary transition from a unicellular to a multicellular lifestyle.”
Krystyna Anna Liskiewicz
The goal of my master thesis is to identify potential adhesins of fish pathogen Yersinia ruckeri. The type Ve secretion proteins are here in focus. The adhesins would then be expressed in E.coli cells and used in adhesion assays to the fish cell lines. In this way also the receptors for adhesins could be determined. The findings would help to understand the role of invasin-like molecule in host infection.
Vegard Iversen
Modifications in histone tails is an epigenetic mechanism for changing the nature of chromatin, and ultimately gene expression. The Aalen lab has identified the CW domain as a novel reader recognizing such marks. CW domains are present in a number of plant and animal chromatin associated proteins in combination with various other reader and/or writer domains, a possible explanation of epigenetic inheritance. Of special interest in plants are the members of the family of Methyl-CpG-Binding domain (MBD) proteins that have a CW domain. The aim of my project is to elucidate the biological and biochemical function of CW-MBD proteins of Arabidopsis, investigating the potential function in light-regulated processes, dormancy and seed development.
Solveig Bua Løken
My MSc-project is a systematic and biogeographical study of a group of small, cupulate, black ascomycetes in the fungal genus Helvella. The species in this group are morphologically very similar and difficult to distinguish in the field, but molecularly they represent divergent evolutionary lineages. I will try to properly delimit the phylogenetic species within this species complex and resolve the phylogenetic relationships between them, using different genetic markers
Simen Hyll Hansen
My project seeks to find out if there is a correlation between the composition of foliar endophytic fungi communities and environmental variables such as annual temperature and precipitation, using the SEEDCLIM climate grid and HTS on host plants Bistorta vivipara and Campanula rotundifolia.