Symbiotic associations between microbes and eukaryotes are ubiquitous and vital for many taxa on Earth. Starting with the original endosymbiosis events that produced mitochondria and chloroplast organelles, these associations have enabled amazing shifts in habitats, niches, and lifestyles.

“All zoology is really ecology. We cannot fully understand the lives of animals without understanding our microbes and our symbioses with them.”

-Ed Yong, I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life

Studying these inter-species relationships offers insights into how hosts and symbionts interact and how these associations evolve. However, disentangling the biology of symbiotic organisms living in close contact is a challenging task because often one lives inside the other and both are dependent on the association for survival.

To robustly test these questions in symbiosis, we use a range of powerful methodological skill and tool-sets, ranging from microscopy, to cell biology, to next-gen sequencing and computational biology, to interrogate the host and symbiont simultaneously.