BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//Talks.cam//talks.cam.ac.uk//
X-WR-CALNAME:Talks.cam
BEGIN:VEVENT
SUMMARY:Plenary Lecture 7: Spatio-temporal dynamics of microbial ecosystem
  metabolism - Segre\, D (Boston University)
DTSTART:20141030T155500Z
DTEND:20141030T163000Z
UID:TALK55803@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Mustapha Amrani
DESCRIPTION:Metabolism\, in addition to being the engine of every living c
 ell\, plays a major role in the cell-cell and cell-environment relations t
 hat shape the dynamics and evolution of microbial communities\, e.g. by me
 diating competition and cross-feeding interactions between different speci
 es. Despite the increasing availability of metagenomic sequencing data for
  numerous microbial ecosystems\, fundamental aspects of these communities\
 , such as the unculturability of most isolates\, and the conditions necess
 ary for taxonomic or functional stability\, are still poorly understood. I
 n the past few years we have been developing new computational methods for
  studying these ecosystems based on genome scale stoichiometric models of 
 metabolism (such as flux balance analysis)\, showing for example how one c
 an computationally identify minimal growth media that could induce metabol
 ic cross-feeding between two microbial species  an approach that has appli
 cations in the nascent fiel d of synthetic ecology. A more comprehensive u
 nderstanding of the role of metabolic networks in the dynamics of microbia
 l communities will require a broader theoretical framework capable of deal
 ing with the multi-scale spatio-temporal complexity of these ecosystems. O
 ur new\, experimentally validated\, open source platform for the Computati
 on of Microbial Ecosystems in Time and Space (COMETS)\, addresses this cha
 llenge by combining flux balance analysis with diffusion equations to simu
 late the 3D spatio-temporal dynamics of metabolism in microbial communitie
 s. While some COMETS predictions are non-intuitive and surprisingly accura
 te\, abundant work is still needed in order to bridge the gap between the 
 dynamics of small engineered communities\, and the huge diversity and comp
 lexity of natural ecosystems.\n
LOCATION:Seminar Room 1\, Newton Institute
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR