Univ.-Prof. Dr. Martin Polz

 

 

 

 

 

Professor at the Division of Microbial Ecology

☎ +43 1 4277 91207

✉ martin.f.polz@univie.ac.at

Microbes are the most abundant and diverse organisms on the planet. Yet how this diversity is structured in the environment remains poorly understood. Martin’s group is broadly interested in structure-function relationships within microbial communities. How do gene flow, environmental interactions, and selection structure populations? How does viral predation drive the ecology and evolution of microbes? How fast do microbes grow in environmental samples?

The group addresses these questions by a combination of in situ molecular approaches, environmental genomics, traditional physiological and genetic techniques, and modelling. They study patterns of diversity among co-occurring microbes from the level of the entire community to the individual genome and gene. Their model systems include marine microbes as well as animal microbiomes. Their latest projects focus on microbe-virus interactions and on growth dynamics under environmental conditions.

Research Topics

Join the Team

If you are interested in joining our team, explore our open positions and learn more about available PhD and postdoc stipends here.

Teaching

To view Martin Polz' teaching activities at the University of Vienna, visit u:find.

Group Members

 Publications

Showing entries 1 - 6 out of 18
Schmider, T., Hestnes, A. G., Brzykcy, J., Schmidt, H., Schintlmeister, A., Roller, B. R. K., Teran, E. J., Söllinger, A., Schmidt, O., Polz, M. F., Richter, A., Svenning, M. M., & Tveit, A. T. (2024). Physiological basis for atmospheric methane oxidation and methanotrophic growth on air. Nature Communications, 15(1), [4151]. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-48197-1
Roller, B. R. K., Hellerschmied, C., Wu, Y., Miettinen, T. P., Gomez, A. L., Manalis, S. R., & Polz, M. F. (2023). Single-cell mass distributions reveal simple rules for achieving steady-state growth. mBio, 14(5), [e0158523]. https://doi.org/10.1128/mbio.01585-23
Strachan, C. R., Yu, X. A., Neubauer, V., Mueller, A. J., Wagner, M., Zebeli, Q., Selberherr, E., & Polz, M. F. (2023). Differential carbon utilization enables co-existence of recently speciated Campylobacteraceae in the cow rumen epithelial microbiome. Nature Microbiology, 8(2), 309-320. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41564-022-01300-y
Piel, D., Bruto, M., Labreuche, Y., Blanquart, F., Goudenège, D., Barcia-Cruz, R., Chenivesse, S., Le Panse, S., James, A., Dubert, J., Petton, B., Lieberman, E., Wegner, K. M., Hussain, F. A., Kauffman, K. M., Polz, M. F., Bikard, D., Gandon, S., Rocha, E. P. C., & Le Roux, F. (2022). Phage-host coevolution in natural populations. Nature Microbiology, 7(7), 1075-1086. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41564-022-01157-1
Kauffman, K. M., Chang, W. K., Brown, J. M., Hussain, F. A., Yang, J. Y., Polz, M. F., & Kelly, L. (2022). Resolving the structure of phage-bacteria interactions in the context of natural diversity. Nature Communications, 13(1), [372]. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-021-27583-z
Hussain, F. A., Dubert, J., Elsherbini, J., Murphy, M., VanInsberghe, D., Arevalo, P., Kauffman, K., Rodino-Janeiro, B. K., Gavin, H., Gomez, A., Lopatina, A., Le Roux, F., & Polz, M. F. (2021). Rapid evolutionary turnover of mobile genetic elements drives bacterial resistance to phages. Science, 374(6566), 488-492. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abb1083