Roland Politan

After seeing a bacteria-powered battery for the first time, I became interested in the different industrial applications of biotechnology to solve global issues. My very first research project was in the field of drug discovery (Kitasato University, Japan), where I was isolating drugs from the soil I collected when I was travelling all over Japan and then tested their efficacy on various drug-resistant pathogens. I then diverged to the field of bioleaching (Curtin University, Australia), where I was looking at the genetic cause of the salt tolerance in the acidophilic yet halotolerant Acidihalobacter aeolianus. For my honours project in geomicrobiology (CSIRO, Australia), I was investigating the role of Fusarium oxysporum in the geochemical cycling of calcium and gold. Currently, I'm working in the Fritz lab on a synthetic biology project, where I aim to produce biodegradable plastics from carbon dioxide using engineered and evolved Vibrio natriegens in collaboration with Woodside

Contact

UWA Bayliss Building, Room 3.60

+61 8 6488 4483

roland.politan@research.uwa.edu.au