About
I am a PhD student in the Department of Molecular Ecology at the Max-Planck-Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen, Germany. My research focuses on computational projects within microbial ecology, with an emphasis on the Verrucomicrobiota phylum.
I have been working as a bioinformatician since my Master’s thesis and continuing into my PhD from April 2022. Here, I’ve applied classical environmental ecology computational techniques to study the diversity, dynamics, and evolution of a specialised phylum of bacteria, the Verrucomicrobiota. This work, supervised by Dr. Luis H. Orellana within the Department of Molecular Ecology and the Research Group for Ecological Genomics, combined large-scale genomics, population genetics, and structural bioinformatics to investigate speciation and intra-population diversity within these populations. I achieved this by developing computational pipelines to identify ecological niches of Verrucomicrobiota members based on both temporal dynamics and predicted gene content of metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs) (Wilkie and Orellana, 2025). I further examined fine-scale population variation using a single nucleotide variant (SNV) analysis pipeline that I designed to detect and interpret evolutionary signals over time (manuscript in preparation). Additionally, I carried out a comparative analysis of the family Akkermansiaceae to explore a gut-to-marine transition, integrating structural homology tools to identify potential functional determinants of adaptation (manuscript in revision).
Prior to this, I graduated in 2020 with a BSc in Biochemistry and Cell Biology, along with a minor in Earth and Environmental Sciences, from Jacobs University (now Constructor University). My undergraduate thesis, titled “The Role of Dissolved Inorganic Phosphorus on the Growth and Elemental Composition of Globally Important N2-Fixing Microorganisms”, was conducted at the Biogeochemistry Department of MPI in Bremen under the supervision of Dr. Wiebke Mohr and Prof. Dr. Matthias Ullrich. I continued my studies at the MPI, completing a Master’s in Marine Microbiology in 2022. For my MSc thesis, titled “Exploring Niche Differentiation in Functionally Similar Heterotrophic Bacteria During Phytoplankton Spring Blooms”, I worked under the supervision of Dr. Luis H. Orellana.
To view a brief version of my CV, click here.