Microbes are the same but different: Incorporating microbial ecophysiology into environmental bioprocess engineering

Dr. Ryan Ziels is an Assistant Professor within the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of British Columbia, with appointments in the Genome Sciences and Technology Training Program and the Environmental Engineering Program at UBC. His research focuses on the role of microbial communities in converting waste materials into high-value resources, such as bioenergy, nutrients, and clean water, to promote a circular economy. He combines multi-omic sequencing with biological process modeling and fundamental engineering design to elucidate mechanisms of nutrient and carbon flow within engineered microbiomes. Recently, his research has focused on new approaches to map microbial metabolic networks within sustainable environmental biotechnologies by quantitatively measuring in situ function and activity.