Climate and Environmental Solutions

Given the current environmental and climate crisis, we have started to look into ways in which our research in microbial systems ecology can contribute to better understand, mitigate and adapt to climate change. We are now using molecular and microbiological analyses and tools to address environmental challenges through the following projects:

• Improving performance and reducing greenhouse gas emissions of wastewater treatment through a better understanding of the eco-evolutionary dynamics in an aerobic granular sludge system (Guilhem, external page Simon van Vliet and external page Nicolas Derlon)
• Assessing the impact of high-temperature heat storage on the groundwater microbiome (Kim and Megan, external page ARTS Collaboration)
  
• Developing biosensors for cyanotoxins based on aptamer and CRISPR technology (with external page Oliver Brandenberg and external page Elisabeth Janssen)
  
• Working towards underground CO₂ sequestration by biomineralisation (with external page Oliver Brandenberg and Joaquin Jimenez-Martinez)