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My interest for the area of astrobiology stems from the study of microbiology as an undergraduate student in biological sciences. Our microbiology courses are co-lectured by different UCL faculties, and the lectures delivered by Joanne Satini based on her research of arsenic metabolism has drawn my interest into the field of extremophilic microbiology. She introduced not only resistance to arsenic contamination, but also the intriguing ability of incorporating arsenate into genetic material as analogue of phosphate, as well as arsenite oxidisers from hypersaline environments.

After having completed a 10-week internship with SPS and Astrobiology, I can highly recommend the experience to anyone who may be interested. I first came across the opportunity on the OU’s OpportunityHub and sent my application into the OU internships team. I was invited for an online interview where I was asked to make a presentation outlining how I would drive engagement to a specific event. Once I started the internship my line managers, Alice and Hannah, were extremely supportive, empowering, encouraging and gave me autonomy over the projects I worked on.

It’s World Space Week and there are some exciting objects visible in the sky this week, not just for night owls but for early risers too. All visible to the naked eye, you’ll be able to see planets, a day moon, constellations and one of the brightest stars in the night sky.

The Moon

My name is Veli, and I am a 2^nd year PhD student at AstrobiologyOU. This is the second time I am writing a blog post for AstrobiologyOU – my first blog was about my summer internship with the group which morphed into the PhD project that I am currently doing. It has been a truly wonderful journey to get here!

I won’t lie, I was nervous, nervous to leave my 3-year-old for the longest I had yet (a whole week!), and nervous for my first real trip abroad since before I went on maternity leave in 2018 and the pandemic of course… !

This poem is dedicated to my recent findings of novel microbial species from a brine prepared from natural magnesium sulfate crystals, which is chemically similar to the sulfate-rich brines of early Mars.

You can listen to it here

A “NOVEL” Story of Life in Salt 

This week is National Apprenticeship Week 2023, and we’d like to give a BIG shout out to our apprentices. We have two apprentices working for AstrobiologyOU. Weronika is our Microbiology Technician Apprentice. She is working on her Level 3 Laboratory Technician apprenticeship with Tiro. Jitka is our Laboratory Technician and is working on her Level 6 Laboratory Scientist degree apprenticeship with Kent University.