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SUMMARY:EESS talk on "Uncovering Microbial Potential: From Chemical Biotra
 nsformation to Resource Recovery"
DTSTART:20251111T121500
DTEND:20251111T124500
DTSTAMP:20260406T064243Z
UID:93630bae9a841762f93f5c8cc91fa3c9faebca592ee01cbee798b074
CATEGORIES:Conferences - Seminars
DESCRIPTION:Dr. Yaochun Yu\, Eawag\nAbstract:\n\n\nBiotransformation play
 s a crucial role in understanding the environmental fate of anthropogenic 
 chemicals in both engineered and natural environments. While efforts have 
 been made to study the contaminants persistence across environmental compa
 rtments\, identifying the molecular insights of these reactions (e.g.\, mi
 croorganisms and enzymes) remains challenging. In this seminar\, I will sh
 owcase how my research has progressed from identifying microorganisms resp
 onsible for the biotransformation of specific organic contaminants (e.g.\,
  PFAS) using cultivation-dependent methods to developing cultivation-indep
 endent approaches for broader applications. I will also discuss how these 
 findings contribute to developing early warning systems for wastewater tre
 atment plants and advancing the vision of harnessing microbial potential f
 or simultaneous pollutant removal and waste-to-resource recovery.\n\n\n\n\
 n\nBiography:\n\n\n\nDr. Yu received his B.S. in Hydrology and Water Resou
 rces Engineering from Jilin University (2015) and his M.S. (2017) and Ph.D
 . (2021) in Environmental Science and Engineering from the University of I
 llinois Urbana–Champaign. He was a visiting project scientist at the Uni
 versity of California\, Riverside (2019–2021) and later a postdoctoral r
 esearcher at Eawag and ETH Zurich (2022–2025). He will join Stanford Uni
 versity as an Assistant Professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering i
 n January 2026\, with an interim appointment as Acting Assistant Professor
 . Dr. Yu’s research focuses on chemical–microbe interactions across di
 verse environments\, aiming to understand how microorganisms transform ant
 hropogenic chemicals\, how these transformations influence ecosystem funct
 ions and human health\, and how this knowledge can be leveraged to design 
 innovative bioremediation strategies.\n\n
LOCATION:GC B1 10 https://plan.epfl.ch/?room==GC%20B1%2010 https://epfl.zo
 om.us/j/69011077410
STATUS:CANCELLED
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