María del Rocío López Igual
Group: Biology and Genetic Engineering of Multicellular Cyanobacteria
Position: Ramón y Cajal contract
Contact:
Office: DS119
Phone: 954 48 95 95
E-mail:
Formation
B.Sc. in Biology, University of Seville, 2004.
PhD in Biology, University of Seville, 2011.
Post-doc, CEA-Saclay, Paris, France, 2012-14
Post-doc, Institut Pasteur, Paris, France, 2014-18
Principal Investigator, PID-2019 Young Researchers Project, IBVF, Seville, Spain.
Ramón y Cajal Contract, University of Seville, 2023-27, IBVF, Seville, Spain
Research Interests
My interest in cyanobacteria started in my Ph.D. thesis and continued in my first post-doc. In these positions I answered biological questions about these photosynthetic bacteria. In my second post-doc, I contributed to the creation of a line of research in synthetic biology, building “smart antibiotics” for pathogenic bacteria. Currently, I am combining my previous knowledge to create my line on cyanobacteria and synthetic biology. My goal is to contribute to the creation of new genetic tools to improve the use of cyanobacteria in genetic engineering and biotechnology. The use of cyanobacteria in biotechnology is a sustainable process due to their photoautotrophic metabolism, so it is necessary to advance in this field.
Publications