College of Medicine microbiologist and MIT’s Otto Cordero were recently awarded a grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) to create synthetic microbiomes — communities of microorganisms — that will better protect aquatic environments from bacteria.

The team discovered that microbes are organized in “ecological modules” that could be mixed and matched to construct microbiomes to better fight pathogens. They are working with shrimp farms in Ecuador to build new microbial communities for aquaculture that will improve shrimp health.

About 50% of the seafood consumed worldwide is grown through aquaculture, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and that number is expected to increase as world demand for seafood outpaces natural sources. Aquaculture farms raise shrimp and other seafood in enclosed tanks where bacteria can infect the entire stock, and pose a potential health concern for consumers.

The Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝-MIT team is working with farmers in Ecuador because that country is one of the top three shrimp exporters in the world. In 2022, Ecuador produced 2.34 billion pounds of shrimp worth over $6.6 billion — with much of that seafood reaching U.S. markets.

“Any disease can spread quickly and it’s hard to separate infected from non-infected shrimp,” Almagro-Moreno says. “The effects of microorganisms on animal health and disease resistance are areas that can have a severe impact on our ability to produce foods.”

Using a fast-growing species of brine shrimp called Artemia salina, the team will test how different synthetic microbial communities increase the shrimp’s resistance to Vibrio parahaemolyticus, a pathogenic bacterium that spreads in water. Almagro-Moreno compares the process to using probiotics for improved gut health, but in a more sophisticated and targeted fashion.

“It is real world application,” says. Almagro-Moreno, who will not only track bacterial spread but also study how to maximize shrimp production. The team hopes to help farmers learn how and why bacteria infect aquaculture farms and the best ways to prevent it.

Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ received almost $500,000 from the NSF for its work on the project. The grant will also fund a bridge program between Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝-MIT and the National Center for Aquaculture and Marine Research in Ecuador. That collaboration will allow the U.S. scientists to visit Ecuador to share ideas, implement new systems and bring Ecuadorian researchers to America to learn the team’s new techniques and approaches.

“Our ultimate goal is to translate these techniques to the USA’s own aquaculture production, such as oyster farms, and to eventually be able to treat and prevent human infections,” Almagro-Moreno said.

Using synthetic microbiomes to prevent bacterial infections is the latest avenue for Almagro-Moreno, whose work focuses on Vibrio cholerae, which causes cholera, and the flesh-eating bacterium Vibrio vulnificus found predominately on the eastern coast of Florida. His team looks at environmental factors and genetic traits to understand how harmless bacteria evolve and adapt to become infectious to humans.

The author of 42 publications in highly prestigious journals and books, he is playing an increasing role as a scientific communicator about infectious disease. In the past year, , the premier journal in microbiology, invited him to write a cover article about the emergence of pathogens, and  asked him to do a cover story about the importance of understanding how pathogens evolve. This year he co-edited a book on “Vibrio spp. Infections” for Springer Nature and provides  expert opinion to the FDA on flesh-eating bacteria. The Research Corporation for Science Advancement recently named him a Scialog Fellow for his work looking at the risk of novel emergent pathogens. Last year he was the first person at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ to receive the highly prestigious Burroughs Wellcome Fund Investigator in the Pathogenesis of Infectious Disease Award.

Meet the microbiology world’s Sherlock Holmes – Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ Assistant Professor of Medicine Salvador Almagro-Moreno. His work in the field over the past 20 years and his ability to connect dots has resulted in pioneering work that’s helping map out the steps and triggers that lead to the emergence of potentially lethal pathogens.

His reputation resulted in the premier journal in microbiology, ,  inviting him to write a perspective article about the emergence of pathogens, which published this spring.

Almagro-Moreno and his team carefully constructed a map of the various complicated connections and steps including a bacteria’s genetic connection to their environments that predispose certain ones to go rogue. He’s used Vibrio vulnificus, also known as flesh eating bacteria, and Vibrio cholerae, the agent of the diarrheal disease cholera, as his model systems. Not only is the Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ professor an excellent scientist, .

That’s why also asked him to write a piece explaining the connections and why understanding how pathogens evolve is important. The magazine is well respected among scientists, and they are the ones who write the articles, but they are geared for a general audience. The article is the cover piece of the magazine’s May/June edition available on newsstands now.

“This is very exciting,” he says. “It is complicated, but we are putting the puzzle pieces together. By using a holistic approach where we mixed ecology, computational biology, and molecular genetics we are figuring it out and I’m excited because now predicting emergence events is a possibility and that’s critical with the emergence of global pandemics like cholera and COVID-19. We need these tools to help manage disease outbreaks and address public health.”

His most recent scholarly paper was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, but his piece in American Scientist is much more accessible to the general public and explains the history of pathogens from the Black Plague to COVID-19 and why the recipe for triggering pathogens has been so elusive. It’s not just mainstream publications that ask for his help. He provides expert opinion to the Food and Drug Administration on flesh-eating bacteria and has been awarded a U.S. National Science Foundation Career Award grant.

“The process is really complicated,” he says with a smile. “It’s a culmination of a lot of different expertise. My lab has students and post-docs with a variety of skills. Together we are making progress. I’m super excited because now we have a clearer picture of how it all works.”

Bacteria can make leaps in evolution because of some unique traits that allow it to pick up and reproduce DNA material that may be floating in their environment. As that material changes, so does the bacteria. His field work in India and the United States, including work done in Brevard and Indian River counties in Florida indicate that there are ecological drivers that lead to the selection of pathogenic traits and virulent strains.

In the American Scientist, he explains.

“Clearly, a plethora of mechanisms and vehicles exist that allow bacteria to acquire new traits from the environment, helping them achieve the quantum leap that can lead to their emergence as pathogens. But evolution does not follow an intentional course, so the quantum leap can also take bacteria in the wrong direction: Acquiring foreign genetic fragments can cause substantial wreckage and disrupt an organism’s well-ingrained physiology. Identifying the environments and conditions that favor microbial risk-taking is an active area of research.”

Many of the clues fell into place when the professor and his team were doing work in the Indian River Lagoon in East Central Florida, and they discovered a new species of bacteria. On the surface it looked like the bacteria they have been studying for several years – V. vulnificus. But when they looked at it on the genetic level, they discovered it was not. The new species is Vibrio floridiensis. It is the closest known relative to the infamous flesh-eating bacterium, but it is not harmful.

“This new species is so close we almost missed it,” he says. “Once we took a close look some of the pieces fell into place.”

There’s still plenty to figure out, he says. But at least now the team has a map with landmarks for figuring out the process. Like Sherlock Holmes, he’s up for the challenge.

“It’s critical we keep moving forward putting the pieces together and making sure they fit,” he says. “We’re still pioneering. As the world changes, it is important to figure out the drivers because COVID is just the latest pathogen to get global attention because of the big impact it had on us. There is more to come, and we need the tools to help us get through it.”

Almagro-Moreno joined Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ in 2017 and established  He holds multiple degrees from universities in Spain and Ireland and completed his postdoctoral studies as the Ernest Everett Just Postdoctoral Fellow at Dartmouth College. He has published dozens of journal articles and his lab has received more than $1.2 million in grant funding. He was named a U.S. National Science Foundation CAREER award recipient. He also received the “Ramon y Cajal” award, the most prestigious award given by the Government of Spain to an early career scientist. He is a member of the Ěý˛ą˛Ô»ĺ the Genomics and Bioinformatics cluster at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝.

A new study from the Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ found that the environmental lifestyle that bacteria possess reveal why some go rogue and turn deadly while others remain harmless to humans.

The findings, which published recently in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, focus on Vibrio vulnificus, better known as the flesh-eating bacteria. However, what the scientists found could help create a model that may well extend to other human pathogens.

“From COVID to V. vulnificus the emergence of human pathogens is one of the most concerning public health issues facing us,” says lead author Salvador Almagro-Moreno, an assistant professor of medicine at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝. “But we know surprisingly very little about what triggers the change from harmless to deadly. We want to answer that question using aquatic pathogens such as the agent of cholera or V. vulnificus as model systems. Our study is a big step in understanding this emergence phenomenon, and will hopefully help us predict, prevent and manage future outbreaks.”

V. vulnificus, a bacterium found in the marine environment, often causes necrotizing fasciitis, an infection in which the flesh around an open wound die, giving the bacterium the name “flesh-eating.” Consumption of raw oysters contaminated with this bacterium can also cause the more severe and life-threatening septicemia in patients with underlying health conditions such as diabetes mellitus. V. vulnificus is one of the fastest-killing human pathogens with a striking mortality rate of more than 50 percent. But not all the strains of this bacterium can kill humans and in fact, most are unable to cause harm, Almagro-Moreno says. Surprisingly, the ecological and genetic reasons behind this drastic difference have remained enigmatic for decades.

For this study, Almagro-Moreno, who provides expert opinion to the Food and Drug Administration on flesh-eating bacteria, investigated populations of V. vulnificus in the Indian River Lagoon in East Central Florida because the bacterium is endemic to this region. The aim of the study was to investigate potential genomic and ecological factors that might facilitate the emergence of deadly variants of V. vulnificus.

He and his team collected a variety of samples between 2018 and 2019 from two areas of the lagoon, which stretches more than 150 miles from Volusia to Palm Beach County. They investigated a wide range of factors that included variables like the bacterial communities in the environment, water pollutants, dissolved organic matter or the presence of algal blooms among others. Before sampling, the team developed a novel genetic marker that could rapidly screen the samples on a large scale to detect specifically V. vulnificus and discriminate between strains that can cause disease to humans and those that don’t.

“This accurate marker will aid in the detection of V. vulnificus globally, which we hope will be used by public health authorities to prevent or manage outbreaks” says Almagro-Moreno.

Moreno’s team found some striking associations between the likelihood of identifying deadly strains of the bacterium and some ecological factors and genomic determinants.

“Our results indicate how ecosystems may be generating pressures that facilitate the emergence of specific strains with pathogenic potential within a natural population,” says Almagro-Moreno. “We now have evidence that the environment plays a most critical role in shaping the emergence of this pathogen. Nonetheless, we are pathogen hunters and there is much more research to conduct. But this is a critical starting point in solving the mystery of what are the elements/ingredients that make a pathogen?”

The rest of the study team includes Mario Lopez-Perez, Jane M. Jayakumar, and Trudy-Ann Grant from Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s Burnett School of Biomedical Sciences. It also includes Asier Zaragoza-Solas and Pedro Cabello-Yeves from the Universidad Miguel Hernandez in Alicante, Spain.

Almagro-Moreno joined Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ in 2017 and established He holds multiple degrees from universities in Spain and Ireland and completed his postdoctoral studies as the Ernest Everett Just Postdoctoral Fellow at Dartmouth College. He has published dozens of journal articles and his lab has received more than $1.2 million in grant funding. In 2021 he was recipient of the U.S. National Science Foundation CAREER award and recently received the “Ramon y Cajal” award, the most prestigious award given by the Government of Spain to an early career scientist. He is a member of the and the Genomics and Bioinformatics cluster at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝.

For example, one researcher is tracking down what triggers harmless microorganisms into going rogue and turning into deadly pathogens such as flesh-eating bacteria. Another faculty member is working to make artificial intelligence systems street smart, so they can make sound real-time decisions that could avert disasters such as a national blackout when the electrical grid system is overloaded.

The recipients will share about $3 million over five years. The awardees are:

• Salvador Almagro-Moreno, College of Medicine
• Samik Bhattacharya, College of Engineering and Computer Science
• Yanjie Fu, College of Engineering and Computer Science
• Lorraine Leon, College of Engineering and Computer Science
• Robert Steward Jr., College of Engineering and Computer Science

NSF uses the awards to recognize early career professionals with promising research who have the potential to serve as academic role models and lead their respective fields. This year’s recipients bring the total of Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ awardees to more than 50 in the past 10 years. A full list of NSF CAREER awards recipients at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝, which dates as far as university records go,

This year’s recipients share a relentless drive, infinite curiosity and a real desire to help students succeed. They all said they are eager to ensure the next generation of scientists and engineers are well equipped to confront challenges we haven’t even imagined yet.

Tracking Down Bacteria That Go Rogue

Assistant Professor Salvador Almagro-Moreno

• Burnett School of Biomedical Sciences, College of Medicine
• Sustainable Coastal Systems Cluster
• Genomic and Bioinformatics Cluster
• CAREER Grant: $783,014

Assistant Professor Almagro-Moreno grew up in the port city of Cadiz, on the southern coast of Spain. He says he remembers being fascinated by the sea around him even as a young boy, which is what sparked his curiosity about the microorganisms that live in the water. After earning multiple degrees from universities in Spain and Ireland with distinguished graduate fellowships, he moved to the United States to finish his doctoral degree at Dartmouth College. He also completed postdoctoral studies at Dartmouth as the Ernest Everett Just Postdoctoral Fellow.

His work focuses on identifying what are the genetic and environmental triggers that lead some seemingly harmless bacteria to go rogue and become infectious and often lethal to humans. He works with the agent of the severe diarrheal disease cholera as a model system and also conducts extensive studies on Vibrio vulnificus more commonly known as flesh-eating bacteria. Florida is the perfect place to study these bacteria because the warm weather creates ideal conditions for bacteria in water, which was a major driver on his decision to join Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ in 2017.

He’s been busy. Since his arrival at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ he’s published dozens of papers and given many talks. Since 2020 he’s been an advisor to the FDA regarding the risks associated with flesh-eating bacteria.

Almagro-Moreno’s passion comes through in how he communicates about what he does. His expertise and easy-to-understand style can be seen in his TEDx talk from 2018. The only thing he cares about more than his research is his students. His lab includes a postdoctoral scholar, a doctoral candidate, a student pursuing a master’s degree, one lab technician and three undergraduates who are all working on their own projects. They all say he spends a considerable amount of time working with them to make sure they are learning and thinking about their next steps on their career paths.

“When I was at Dartmouth, I co-established a program to develop a pathway towards success for groups typically underrepresented in STEM fields” he says. “A lot of the time you just don’t know the path if you come from certain communities. When I was in graduate school, I spent a lot of time running around figuring things out. Unless you meet good mentors, you can miss out. That’s why I’m particularly thrilled to get this CAREER award. It will allow me to set up a similar program here for our students. Mentoring early and in a consistent manner throughout their career paths is how we diversify the field and make it more inclusive, because it is not just enough to talk the talk. You have to walk the walk.”

The award will help establish the inclusive Synergy Scholars program for students and help expand his research collaboration and bridge program with the Universidad Interamericana de Puerto Rico, he says.

“The recognition is nice,” he says. “But what really matters to me is that the award will allow me to expand my research program and, very importantly, give me an opportunity to work with students and help them identify paths towards success so they can continue to push forward and achieve their career goals.”

Sleek Manta Rays Inspire Engineer

Assistant Professor Samik Bhattacharya

• College of Engineering and Computer Science
• Center for Advanced Turbomachinery and Energy Research
• CAREER Grant: $505,557

Working in a corner of a warehouse on Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s main campus, Assistant Professor Bhattacharya taps instructions onto a computer keyboard, which sends a do-it-yourself contraption sailing through a translucent tank full of water. Suspended in the water is a piece of black material, which cuts through the turbulent water slightly bending as it moves.

“We can learn a lot from nature,” Bhattacharya says while students tweak a laser to better see what is going on in the water. “The morphing wings of a giant manta [ray] glide effortlessly through turbulent waters. We want to learn the mechanics behind how the manta and dolphin maneuver to apply them to underwater vehicles so they can be flexible and fast.”

If the mechanics can be cracked, unmanned water vehicles could be greatly improved. These vehicles are used by industry seeking out potential underwater gas and oil deposits, while some scientists use them to explore the deepest depths of the ocean floor. Militaries around the world also use these vehicles to detect and disarm or destroy underwater mines.

“They are used when it is too dangerous for people,” says Bhattacharya. “But their use is limited because they are not very flexible, and they fail in turbulent waters. We are trying to make them highly maneuverable, which would make them a lot more useful.”

That starts with understanding the mechanics behind highly flexible and pliable things in liquid, such as the fins and tails of stingrays and dolphins. His lab includes computers that model these and other creatures’ flexible wings and fins. But the center piece is the custom-made water tank system and laser that helps him see how his tweaks to materials work in water. The tank allows him to test the strips of material in calm and turbulent water, which his team controls from a computer station. His students run multiple tests in the tank and observe the bending dynamics on the computer screen. Sensors measure the forces and feed the data to the computer.

Hands-on experience and experimentation are key to advancing the understanding of fluid dynamics and helping future engineers be ready for anything, said Bhattacharya.

For Carlos Soto, who is pursuing a master’s degree in aerospace engineering, working in the lab is an opportunity to continue his love of math and robotics while getting involved. He helped build the DIY contraption that pulls sample materials through the water tank.

“Dr. Bhattacharya encourages you to ask hard questions,” he says. “He helps if you ask, but he really encourages you to get there yourself. And he is very patient.”

The CAREER grant means that Bhattacharya’s lab will be able to expand its work and continue to support the training of his promising students.

Teaching Artificial Intelligence Street Smarts

Assistant Professor Yanjie Fu

• College of Engineering and Computer Science
• Learning Sciences Cluster
• CAREER Award: $569,333

Fu is working on developing machine-learning techniques to equip machines with the intelligence needed to bridge the gap between understanding what will happen and solving how to change it in a dynamic system. Then the AI would have the ability to process how its decisions affect other actions and how that impacts a system overall, all in real time.

A good example of a dynamic system is the electrical grid system. It is carefully monitored and must be adjusted throughout the day as demands for energy go up and down in different parts of a city, state and region. If a big event occurs or a surge in demand happens, adjustments must be made to ensure energy delivery is uninterrupted. Those adjustments must be done quickly and carefully, with full knowledge of how each tweak can impact the rest of the grid system at any given time. Engineers working the grid apply book knowledge, but also develop street smarts based on experience. A few bad choices and a city or state can face massive blackouts. Keeping the system operating continuously and without interruptions is a high-pressure business.

Fu is looking for ways to make it possible for AI to do the job without fail across these kinds of networks. Other applications include air transportation networks to traffic signals in big cities that adjust to keep traffic moving at peak commute times.

“The award will help me to focus on the cutting-edge artificial intelligence research in the next five years and integrate my research into real systems and education,” Fu says.

For Fu, the work is exciting because he says AI is the future.

“Research represents the vision to drive human explorations towards the unknown,” he says. “Second, research is the most important means to discover new understandings of nature and science and derive fundamental mechanisms of information and systems.”

Before joining Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ in 2019, Fu worked at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center and the University of Missouri at Rolla. He holds several degrees including a doctorate in management information systems from Rutgers University.

Tapping into Molecule Builders to Design New Materials

Assistant Professor Lorraine Leon

• College of Engineering and Computer Science
• CAREER Grant: $550,000

Assistant Professor Lorraine Leon is a chemical engineer who spends her time designing materials that mimic the properties of natural biomaterials. She does this by creating molecules based on peptides (small proteins) that are programmed to assemble into larger structures and adapt to different types of stimulation.

If successful, these new biomaterials could be useful in a variety of fields from medicine to energy. Leon and her team of five students are focused in two areas:

• Designing carriers for potentially life-saving drugs and nucleic acids that can help patients battling diseases such as cancer and
• Building new biomaterials used to create dynamic ecofriendly reactors.

She’s inspired by nature. It was in college that she learned that biomolecules organize into larger structures through self-assembly. There is no outside force guiding them. That is why understanding the design of biomolecules is so important. The building instructions for things like the cell wall are programmed into the molecule. It’s the molecular design that is key to being able to build new materials for broader application.

“The NSF Career grant will help us design new biomaterials used to create dynamic ecofriendly reactors,” she says. “We will accomplish this by designing new peptides that assemble into multilayered liquids containing functional proteins called enzymes. Inside of cells these type of transient structures are used to control chemical reactions.”

With more than a dozen peer-reviewed journal articles and another dozen invited lectures, Leon is on her way to becoming a master builder of these new materials, which hold so much promise.

Before joining the materials science and engineering department at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ in 2017, she spent five years as a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute for Molecular Engineering at the University of Chicago and Argonne National Laboratory. She holds a doctorate in chemical engineering from City University of New York and a bachelor’s degree in the same field from University of Florida. At Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝, her lab is located at the College of Medicine at Lake Nona and she is also an affiliate member at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s NanoScience Technology Center.

Like the other Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ award recipients, Leon is passionate about preparing the next generation of scientists. She does this through the several courses she teaches, and the mentorship in her lab. She works closely with two doctoral candidates and three undergraduates. She publicly thanked one of those students – Sara Tabandeh – on her Twitter account when notified about the award earlier this month.

“Both Ph.D. students have been part of the lab from the beginning,” Leon says. “They were instrumental in getting the lab set up, and are excellent lab citizens, they each manage specific instrumentation, mentor undergraduates, in addition to conducting research towards their dissertation. The undergraduates help the graduate students with their research, and eventually transition to individual projects. I have a great team.”

Dissecting Cell Mechanics to Understand Disease

Assistant Professor Robert Steward Jr.

• College of Engineering and Computer Science, College of Medicine
• CAREER Grant: $500,000

The body is often referred to as a machine and if that’s the case, Steward is a mechanic trying to find out what causes the heart and blood vessels to break.

In this analogy, heart disease and diabetes are the breakdowns. Using his background in cell biology and engineering, Steward looks at the cells that line inside of blood vessels to examine the mechanics at work.

He uses an automated fluorescent microscope coupled with complex mathematical algorithms to see, model and calculate the mechanical forces generated by cells. This high-tech system allows him to determine how strong cells are working. In the case of heart disease, the cells appear to exert more pressure, which then also impacts blood flow. If we can better understand these dynamics, we may be able to develop mechanic-based therapies to help stop or potentially eliminate heart disease, he said. The technique is applicable to other kinds of cells that he hopes his work is a stepping-stone that can be used to add the knowledge necessary to find a cure to heart disease, diabetes and cancer.

Steward says the CAREER grant will help him fund his lab provide more time to spend mentoring students. For him, helping students find their way especially into research areas that aren’t yet established is part of his core mission.

The Chicago native is the only biomedical/mechanical engineer working with cell mechanics at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝.

“I found cell mechanics by accident,” he says. “I knew I wanted to work in the medical field, and I knew I liked engineering, but I had no idea I could combine the two.”

He attended Clarke Atlanta University, which he says played a big role in finding his way to a doctoral degree and more opportunities to better his life. Through the university he was able to get a National Institutes of Health fellowship. Even then, he wasn’t quite sure what to do with it. The fellowship came with funding to cover two years of research anywhere, but it didn’t come with instructions.

“I didn’t know what to do,” he says. “So, I started calling universities and telling them I have funding, am studying mechanical engineering and I wanted to do research in biology, do you have a lab that might be a good fit?”

After several phone calls he ended up at the University of Maryland at College Park working with a professor in the orthopedic biomechanics lab during the summer after his junior year of college. The following year he made another round of cold calls and ended up at Carnegie Mellon University, where he would eventually earn his doctorate. He also met a mentor that helped shape his future. Next stop was Harvard University where he completed post-doctoral work and was able to work alongside medical doctors. It was a life-changing experience.

“Doctors are no-nonsense,” he says. “They would tell me, that’s great, but how is that going to help me help my patient. I really liked that environment.”

That was one big reason he joined Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ in 2015. It was an opportunity to work in engineering and alongside doctors again. Steward’s lab is at the Lake Nona campus and he splits his time on the main campus where he teaches engineering classes.

The best part about the CAREER grant, he says, is the ability to mentor more students and spend more time in the lab, which will lead to more discoveries and publications.

“I didn’t know graduate school was an option,” he says. “I didn’t know I could turn my love of engineering into this amazing career. I didn’t see a lot of people who looked like me once I started doing research. The difference for me was meeting the right mentors. I want to be that for my students. I know because I’ve lived it. So that’s why this grant means so much to me. It will buy me more time to mentor students.”

Name: Salvador Almagro-Moreno
Positions: Assistant professor of medicine at the Burnett School of Biomedical Sciences (College of Medicine). Faculty member of the Sustainable Coastal Systems Ěý˛ą˛Ô»ĺ Genomic and Bioinformatics clusters.

Why are you interested in this research?
SAM: I’m from an island — the port city of Cadiz, on the southern coast of Spain — so I’ve always been fascinated by the ocean and wanted to study something associated with aquatic environments. When I was pursuing my bachelors, I took courses in microbiology and evolutionary biology and things started clicking: I wanted to study the evolution of aquatic microorganisms. Finally, while doing my Masters at the National University of Ireland I noticed that my molecular biology professor was doing research on that topic. I joined her lab and have dedicated my career to researching this topic ever since.

Are you a faculty member or student conducting research at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝? We want to hear from you!

Who inspires you to conduct your research?
SAM: My students and mentees. As a mentor and educator, there is an incredible sense of joy and pride that you get when you see the glow in the eyes of a student after they manage to “connect the dots” and find out something new, be it in class or in the lab.

Humans are curious by nature and we all love a challenge — science merges both! So, with the right training and mentoring, you can learn awe-inspiring subjects, make novel discoveries and push your intellectual boundaries.

How does Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ empower you to do your research?
SAM: We study coastal pathogens that inhabit warm and tropical waters. Some of them are endemic to Florida, such as the agent of a flesh-eating disease that makes the news every summer. Therefore, Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s location is ideal for the research that we do in my lab as we can collect samples from areas where the disease-causing pathogens live naturally.

What major grants and honors have you earned to support your research?
SAM: I was recently the recipient of the U.S. National Science Foundation CAREER award, which also provides funding to my lab for the next five years and recognizes my research and educational efforts. I was also recently selected by the Research Corporation for Science Advancement as a fellow for its new Scialog (science and dialog) initiative focused on mitigating zoonotic diseases. This opportunity allows me to be a part of think tank that will address how to prevent future pandemics. My research program is funded with grants and contracts from the National Institutes of Health, U.S. National Science Foundation, Food and Drug Administration, and U.S.-Israel Binational Science Foundation.

Are you a faculty member or student conducting research at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝? We want to hear from you!

Laurene Tetard, an associate professor in Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s Department of Physics, and Xiaohu Xia, an assistant professor in Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s Department of Chemistry, were selected as fellows by the Research Corporation for Science Advancement as part of its Scialog initiative to mitigate zoonotic threats, or those originating from animals. Tetard and Xia also both have joint appointments in Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s Nanoscience Technology Center.

The researchers join Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝ College of Medicine Assistant Professor Salvador Almagro-Moreno and more than 50 other researchers across the nation who have received the honor.

The Research Corporation for Science Advancement (RCSA) was founded in 1912 and is the oldest foundation for science advancement in the U.S.

The origin of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, is still under debate, but its possible animal origin means researchers are giving special focus to zoonotic diseases and ones that could emerge in the future.

“A deeper understanding of the interactions between animals, people, pathogens and their environments could expand our ability to rapidly detect emerging pathogens and to quickly develop and deploy new countermeasures,” says RCSA Program Director Andrew Feig.

Created in 2010 by RCSA, the Scialog (short for “science + dialog”) format brings together communities of early-career scientists from multiple disciplines and institutions across the U.S. and Canada, and this initiative includes both academic and U.S. Department of Agriculture scientists with the vision of spurring stronger interactions between these groups.

The three-year initiative for addressing zoonotic threats will first meet this fall in Tucson, Arizona.

Guided by a group of senior facilitators, participants will discuss challenges and gaps in current knowledge, build community around visionary goals, and form teams to propose cutting-edge, collaborative research projects. Those considered to have the potential for high-impact results will be selected to receive seed funding.

Tetard says research chosen will stem from the discussions but that her contributions to the community will include her expertise with nanoscale imaging and spectroscopy, which can show how zoonotic threats change over time.

“Viruses and bacteria are small systems that have not been studied extensively with new nanoscale tools, such as those we are working on at Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝,” Tetard says. “Nanoscale imaging and spectroscopy provides the spatial resolution and the sensitivity to detect such small systems and study how they evolve. Participating in this initiative could help in advancing the development of new tools that are better suited for problems related to zoonotic threats. I’m very excited about taking part in these conversations.”

Xia will bring his work with developing advanced nanotechnologies for diagnostics to the Scialog research community.

“I am honored to be selected as a Scialog Fellow, and I am excited for the opportunity to collaborate with leading scientists from multiple disciplines to develop innovative technologies for detection and mitigation of zoonotic threats,” Xia says. “With the support of this fellowship, I’d like to expand my research to the field of detection and diagnosis of zoonotic diseases. I am thrilled by this opportunity to work in a new field. Ultimately, I hope that my research will contribute to mitigation of existing and emerging zoonotic threats.”

Tetard received her doctorate in physics from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville and joined Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s NanoScience Technology Center and Department of Physics, part of Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s College of Sciences, in 2013.

Xia received his doctorate in biochemistry and molecular biology from Xiamen University and joined Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s Department of Chemistry, part of Â鶹ӳ»­´«Ă˝â€™s College of Sciences, in 2018.