How cyanobacteria fix nitrogen - PhD thesis offer

The project of this PhD student aims at extending the understanding of mechanisms of the regulation of photosynthesis for nitrogen fixation in Trichodesmium, for more realistic estimation of the productivity of the oceans. This marine, filamentous, diazotrophic cyanobacterium has a particularly fast regulation of photosynthesis. Phycourobilin isoforms turned out to be the key players in the fast regulation during the daily activity cycle (by their reversible (un)coupling to/from photosystems) as well as in the long‐term regulation (by changes in their expression levels) in response to iron and light stress, they shall be the main focus of this project. This will involve UV/VIS fluorescence kinetic and FRAP measurements for investigating biophysical properties, combined with metalloproteomics for investigating effects of iron limitation, RAMAN spectroscopy and pulse‐chase stable isotope labelling for analysing accumulation/transport of metabolites. 

More information can be read in the attached PDF-file, the position will be filled once the a suitable candidate will be found.