May 2025

News

broken egg shell

Assistant Professor of Veterinary Medicine Mostafa Ghanem was quoted in a Maryland Today article about the bird flu pandemic. A member of the UMD Center of Excellence in Microbiome Sciences and one of the region’s top experts in infectious poultry diseases, Ghanem uses genomic tools to improve our understanding of different risk factors controlling the emergence, evolution, spread and persistence of pathogens within animal production systems and various environments. Learn More.

2025 Microbiome Center Fellowship Recipients Announced

Congratulations to the 2025 Microbiome Center Fellowship recipients! The selection was competitive, with applicants coming from across UMD. The winners are:

  • Raunak Dey (CMNS)
  • Nakia Fallen (CMNS)
  • Claire Barlow (SPH)
  • Darby Steinman (ENGR)
  • Ingrid Roselyne Dukundane (ENGR)
  • Yuzhu Mao (ENGR)
  • Erin Harrelson (AGNR)
  • Yue Jiang (AGNR)


Over the next seven months, the students will engage in interdisciplinary and team science training, networking, presentations, and a capstone panel to advance innovation through microbiome research. Stay tuned for more info on the students and their research in Fall 2025!

Center Events

MicroSocial Seminar Series

The MicroSocial Seminar Series aims to facilitate scientific exchange and community building across the University of Maryland's microbiome research community. Seminars feature short talks by students and faculty, followed by 30 minutes of informal socializing over coffee and snacks.

When: Tuesday, May 13, 2025 at 4 p.m.

Location: ESJ 2204

Speaker: Yuzhu Mao, Ph.D. student, Environmental Engineering    

Talk: "Flushed with Data: Tracking COVID-19 to Candida auris in Community Sewage"

Speaker: Aishwarya Pradeep Rao, Ph.D. student, Food Science

Talk: "Seed to Salad: Detecting Pathogens and Profiling Microbiomes in Microgreens - A Quasimetagenomic Approach"

Get all of the center's upcoming events on your UMD google calendar with one click (only accessible with UMD account).

Other Resources

News of Interest

Fantastic Microbes and Where to Find Them

Support a public research and science communication project uncovering the hidden biodiversity of urban microbes—organisms essential to human and planetary health, yet often overlooked or misunderstood. The team has gathered 2,429 microbiome samples from Milan’s Bicocca district with the help of 80 students. The next phase involves sequencing 200 samples, training students to analyze them using KBase, and shifting public perception from fear to understanding. The project is running an all-or-nothing crowdfunding campaign to raise €5,000, if successful, partners will match the funds. Donate here

Job Openings

Research Technologists and Researchers

Penn State University's One Health Microbiome Center

Penn State University’s One Health Microbiome Center is seeking research technologists (technician) and researchers (non-tenure track, research faculty) to solve hard problems with meaningful work on the molecular biology of animal-bacteria-phage symbioses. Apply here and here.


Open Rank Tenured/Tenure-Track Faculty in Microbiome Studies

University of South Florida and the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine

The University of South Florida (USF) and the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine have launched an open-rank call for recruiting high level scientists in the field of microbiomes. Essential functions of this position include carrying out research on microbiome, publishing, obtaining high-level grants, including NIH grants, and serving as a principal investigator, head of a research group, contributing to the recruitment of faculty, and mentoring USF scientists and MDs. Additional responsibilities include developing philanthropic partnerships and helping shape strategic plans, scientific direction, and recruitment priorities. Learn More.

To have your research, events, or other resources included in the next newsletter, contact the center's program coordinator Gabi Steinbach at gabis@umd.edu.


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