People: Astrobiology Graduate Student Directory

Marcela Ewert Sarmiento
Oceanography

When I decided to study Biology as an undergrad, I was motivated by the fact that the program included classes in chemistry, physics, geology, maths: apparently living beings were a good example to integrate many disciplines. And some topics were more prone to do so: in fact, puzzled by the subtleties of the genetic system, I got more and more interested on the origin of life on Earth, which lead me to study how did our planet came to be, organic molecules on space, the possibilities of life on other planets...and before I noticed it I was immersed in Astrobiology topics. Following that path, I participated on 2005 in a summer school on Astrobiology, hosted by the Vatican Observatory, where I had the chance to meet some of the faculty from the UW Astrobiology program. Now I am working with Dr. Jody Deming in the Oceanography department.

My research is focused on microbes inhabiting the brine pores of sea ice, that is, microbes living in extremely cold and saline environments. In order to survive to such extreme conditions, microbes have developed a number of strategies; one of them is to produce a polymeric substance that changes the physical properties of the environment. My objective is to develop a method based on ice-affinity to isolate these polymers in an unaltered form and test their potential as cryoprotectants.