300317 VO Biodiversity and molecular ecology of microorganisms 1 (2023W)

The lecture will be held in hybrid mode.

It consists of recorded lectures available on Moodle. For each recorded lecture, there will also be an on-site question and answer session.

This lecture provides a detailed overview on established and cutting-edge technologies used in microbial ecology/environmental microbiology. Students are additionally made familiar with the relevant primary literature and current research results.

The first part of this two-part lecture series (second part in summer semester) provides an encompassing overview on state-of-the-art molecular methods for analyzing the composition of microbial communities in complex environmental and medical samples. The lecture starts with the introduction of the microbial species concept and parameters of microbial diversity (species richness and evenness), followed by a detailed description of the full rRNA approach. Further techniques, which are described and critically discussed regarding their suitability for identification and quantification of microorganisms, include fluorescence in situ hybridization, quantitative real-time PCR, and novel high-throughput sequencing technologies (e.g. Illumina).

Theoretical knowledge will be acquired via lectures and original scientific literature. Demonstration of molecular techniques via animations, educational films, and technical illustrative material.

Lecture slides and other teaching materials are provided on Moodle.