DOME

Univ.-Prof. Dr. Jillian Petersen

Professor at the Division of Microbial Ecology

☎ +43 1 4277 91206
✉ jillian.petersen(at)univie.ac.at


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CeMESS/Ludwig Schedl

Animals and plants evolved in a “sea” of microbes. It is therefore not surprising that the vast majority have evolved to rely on microbes for aspects of their health, development, nutrition, and productivity. Jillian Petersen’s group contributes to this rapidly expanding research field. Her work focuses on beneficial interactions between marine invertebrate animals and their sulfur-oxidising bacterial symbionts, as well as marine and terrestrial plant-microbe interactions. The goal is to understand how the symbiotic partners establish and maintain their intimate relationship from generation to generation, and how these associations evolved in such diverse and widespread habitats, from deep-sea hydrothermal vents to shallow water seagrass beds.

Jillian and her group use the full suite of methods for understanding diversity and function of uncultured microbes in natural habitats, including high-throughput sequencing, single-cell imaging, and isotope tracing, among many others. She has received an ERC Starting Grant in 2018, an ERC Consolidator Grant in 2023, is a Board Member for the FWF, and Editor-in-Chief of the ISME Journal.

Research Topics

400 Million Years of Symbiosis: Marine Lucinid Clams and their Sulfur-oxidizing Symbionts

We investigate host-microbe mutualisms in diverse host animal groups, but our main experimental models are lucind clams that host a specific species of sulfur-oxidizing bacteria in their gill cells. Lucinid clams are found worldwide in shallow marine habitats such as coastal seagrass sediments that are easily accessible for sampling. There are hundreds of species of lucinids currently known, and almost every one of these hosts its own specific symbiotic microbes. The symbiotic bacteria are chemosynthetic, which means they use chemical energy from the environment to synthesize sugars and other molecules needed by the host. This ancient and highly successful partnership has resulted in a reduction of the length and complexity of the clam’s digestive tract over evolution, as it relies on its gill symbionts for nutrition.

Uni Wien/Der Knopfdruecker

Selected topics

  • Genomic mechanisms underpinning host-microbe interactions
  • Evolution of host-microbe interactions
  • Host-microbe-environment interactions
  • Influence of hosts and symbionts on nutrient cycling in coastal habitats
  • Fundamental research on terrestrial root nodule symbioses
  • In situ imaging of symbiont identity and activity

Group Members

Dr. Cristina Alcaraz

Postdoc

Dr. Katie Emelianova

Postdoc

Dr. Sophia Ferchiou

Postdoc

Dr. Marie-Therese Fischer

Postdoc

Saee Joshi

PhD Student

Estelle Knecht

Technician

Lukas Leibrecht

PhD Student

Alejandro Llanos Lizcano

PhD Student

Christopher Pree

PhD Student

Dr. Christina Straub

Postdoc

Publications

Perner M, Petersen J, Zielinski FU, Gennerich HH, Seifert R. Geochemical constraints on the diversity and activity of H2-oxidizing bacteria and archaea in diffuse hydrothermal fluids from a basalt- and an ultramafic-hosted vent. FEMS microbiology ecology. 2010 Oct 1;74(1):55–71. doi: 10.1111/j.1574-6941.2010.00940.x

Petersen JM, Ramette A, Lott C, Cambon-Bonavita MA, Zbinden M, Dubilier N. Dual symbiosis of the vent shrimp Rimicaris exoculata with filamentous gamma- and epsilonproteobacteria at four Mid-Atlantic Ridge hydrothermal vent fields. Environmental Microbiology. 2010 Aug;12(8):2204-2218. doi: 10.1111/j.1462-2920.2009.02129.x

Petersen J, Dubilier N. Symbiotic Methane Oxidizers. In Timmis K, McGenity T, van der Meer JR, de Lorenzo V, editors, Handbook of Hydrocarbon and Lipid Microbiology: Vol. 3., Microbes and communities utilization hydrocarbons, oils and lipids. 1 ed. Berlin, Heidelberg: Springer. 2010. p. 1977-1996. 28 doi: 10.1007/978-3-540-77587-4_145

Petersen JM, Dubilier N. Methanotrophic symbioses in marine invertebrates. Environmental Microbiology Reports. 2009 Oct 8;1(5):319-335. doi: 10.1111/j.1758-2229.2009.00081.x

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Microbiomes Drive Planetary Health

Jillian Petersen is part of the FWF-funded Cluster of Excellence (CoE)

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