Birgitta E. Ebert
Birgitta specialises in systems metabolic engineering of microorganisms
Dr. Birgitta Ebert's research interest centers on gaining a systems-level understanding of microbial metabolism and the application of this knowledge to engineer microorganisms into cell factories for natural products including isoprenoids and fatty-acid derived products. In her recent research, Dr. Ebert became especially interested in re-configuring the cell structure of Yeast for lipophilic molecules.
Birgitta Ebert studied Chemical Engineering from 2000 to 2005 at the TU Dortmund University (Dortmund, Germany) with a specialization in biotechnology and technical chemistry. In her diploma thesis at the Chair of Chemical Biotechnology (TU Dortmund, Germany) she computationally analyzed and experimentally verified the metabolic potential of Escherichia coli for whole-cell redox biocatalysis.
During her PhD thesis, supervised by Prof. Dr. Andreas Schmid at the Chair of Chemical Biotechnology (TU Dortmund, Germany), she further applied systems biotechnological approaches to understand and engineer superior whole-cell redox biocatalysts.
From September 2011 to April 2019, Birgitta led a research group at the Institute of Applied Microbiology at RWTH Aachen University (Germany) focused on the rational engineering of microbes for the production of industrially relevant chemicals.
In April 2019, Birgitta joined the Vickers Group at the Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology at the University of Queensland. Her research interest centers on gaining a systems-level understanding of microbial metabolism and the application of this knowledge to engineer microorganisms into cell factories for natural products.
Dr. Ebert is Associate Editor for BMC Biotechnology.
Industry
Dr. Ebert has collaborated with industry on a variety of different projects. Previous industry partneres include: Cargill Deutschlang GmbH, Suedzucker AG, BRAIN AG, Organobalance GmbH (today Novozymes A/S) , B&S ANalytics (today B. Braun Melsungen AG), Lead Discovery Center GmbH.
Collaborations
Dr. Ebert has worked and led several collborative research projects with (inter)national researchers, including Prof. Jochen Foerster (DTU Denmark, now Carlsberg A/S, DK), Prof. Jay D. Keasling (UC Berkeley, USA), Prof Vassily Hatzimanikatis (EPFL, CH), Prof. Christine Lang (Organobalance GmbH, DE)
Key Publications
Alter T, Ebert BE*, Determination of growth-coupling strategies and their underlying principles, BMC Bioinformatics, 2019, 20(1)
Ebert BE*, Czarnotta E, Blank LM. Physiologic and metabolic characterization of squalene overproducing S. cerevisiae. FEMS Yeast Res. 2018, 18(8): foy077.
Czarnotta E, Dianat M, Korf M., Granica F, Merz J, Maury J, Ballal Jacobsen SA, Forster J, Ebert BE*, Blank LM. Fermentation and purification strategies for the production of betulinic acid and its lupane-type precursors in Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Biotechnol Bioeng 2017;114: 2528-38.
Ebert BE, Kurth F, Grund M et al. Response of Pseudomonas putida KT2440 to increased NADH and ATP demand. Appl Environ Microbiol 2011;77: 6597-6605.
Blank LM, Ionidis G, Ebert BE et al. Metabolic response of Pseudomonas putida during redox biocatalysis in the presence of a second octanol phase. FEBS J 2008;275: 5173-5190.