2007-12: Congratulations & farewell, Dr. Cécile Gueidan.

December 2007 – Congratulations and farewell, Dr. Cécile Gueidan.

Lutzoni lab members congratulate Dr. Cécile Gueidan for passing her thesis defense! She has completed her graduate work on Verrucariales and related fungi, and is looking forward to conducting her postdoctoral research at the Centraalbureau voor Schimmelcultures (CBS) in the Netherlands. We send our best wishes to Cécile as she returns to her home continent!

2008-09: Welcome Fernandez & Prieto, Visiting Researchers.

September 2008 – Welcome, Samantha Fernandez and Maria Prieto, Visiting Researchers.

The Lutzoni Lab is excited to welcome two visiting researchers to Duke University: Samantha Fernandez and Maria Prieto. Both hail from the country of Spain, and have come to our lab to learn new techniques and hone their skills for studying the systematics of lichen-forming fungi. Samantha’s research concentrates on the lichen genus Diploschistes, while Maria is interested primarily in the systematics ofCatapyrenium (sensu lato). The relationships between the members of these genera remain quite difficult to elucidate, and the results obtained by both of these researchers will surely represent major contributions to the field of lichen systematics.

2010-11: Welcome, Olaf Mueller, New Postdoc Research Assoc

November 2010 – Welcome, Olaf Mueller, New Postdoctoral Research Associate

We welcome Olaf Mueller to the Lutzoni Lab as a new postdoctoral researcher! Olaf is funded by a subcontract to the lab (‘Co-evolved autotroph-heterotroph associations (AHAs): Lichens and their roles in biological soil crusts’) as part of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory’s (PNNL) foundational scientific focus area (FSFA) under DOE-BER’s genomic sciences program. In collaboration with Drs. Daniele Armaleo and Fred Dietrich, he is conducting comparative genomic analytical work on the first genomes (fungal and algal) sequenced from a lichen symbiosis.