•  Survival and resuscitation mechanisms of desert soil bacteria (2 positions)
  
  • Dagmar Woebken

1. & 2.) Survival and resuscitation mechanisms of desert soil bacteria

Duration of contract: 4 years 
Planned starting date: January 2026 
Place of work: University of Vienna, CeMESS
Main supervisor: Dagmar Wöbken

Project description:

Microorganisms in drylands have to endure long periods of drought, interrupted by unpredictable and very short periods of rain. Dormancy – an inactive state or a state of reduced metabolic activity – has long been regarded as a prerequisite for desert soil microorganisms to survive such drought periods. However, as dormancy cannot be sustained indefinitely, phases of resuscitation must also play an important role for long-term survival of desert soil microorganisms and thus for maintaining microbial diversity in one of the harshest environments on the planet.

In this project, we are investigating the survival strategies of desert soil microorganisms and the mechanisms of their resuscitation. This will be achieved by applying genome-resolved metatranscriptomics of desert soil microbial communities, building upon knowledge gained by our recent metagenomics investigations of biological soil crusts from the Negev Desert, Israel (Meier et al., 2021). In situ community transcription patterns will be linked with single-cell activity assays as described in Imminger & Meier et al., 2024, employing a recently developed heavy water-NanoSIMS assay to detect anabolically active cells, and combined with process measurements.