Join us!

We have a competitively funded PhD project available for an October 2026 start: Functional Understanding the Rumen Mycobiome via Consortia of Anaerobic Gut Fungi 

22-25 September 2025 - International Symposium on Anaerobic Microbiology

We're visiting the ISAM in Leipzig! Louisa and Jolanda are giving oral presentations.  

21 September 2025 - preprint available!

Read the lab's first preprint on anaerobic fungi: Anaerobic gut fungi Caecomyces communis, Neocallimastix frontalis and Piromyces spp. nov., have distinct effects on plant fibres during digestion

8-11 April 2024 - Annual Conference of the Microbiology Society

We're visiting the Annual Conference of the Microbiology Society! You can find Jess and Susana presenting in the poster session on Tuesday (posters A103 and A121, respectively) and Alice and Jolanda (poster B397) on Wednesday 

12-17 March 2024 - 32nd Fungal Genetics Conference

Jess and Jolanda attended the Fungal Genetics Conference in Asilomar and the preceding 2nd Symposium on the Basal Fungal Kingdom. Jess presented her work via a talk on the symposium and a poster on the conference, Jolanda gave a talk in the plenary session. 

1 March 2024 - Louisa's PhD project starts

Louisa Edge joined the team to work on her PhD thesis,  she will work on uncovering the effects that anaerobic gut fungi have on plant cell walls during digestion 

29 Jan 2024 - Stephane Kerangart joined the team

Stephane will support multiple projects around anaerobic gut fungi in his role as research technician. 

21 Nov 2023 - Our colleague Juanma talks about his research on CGTN Europe

SRUC's Gemma Miller and Juanma Palma-Hidalgo explain how they investigate the levels of methane that cows produce during digestion, and how plant-derived compounds can be used as feed additives that reduce methane production. 

14 Nov 2023 - Future Agricultural Researchers PhD Conference

Alice attended the Future Agricultural Researchers PhD Conference 2023 organised by The Agricultural Universities Council UK, and won first prize for her poster presentation. Congrats Alice!

8 Nov 2023 - REAP conference

What does a beer have to do with rumen fungi? Jolanda will speak on the REAP Conference, in the session on Emerging Agri-Tech – Research Into Practice. You may know fungi as the producers of products that we are all familiar with, such as beer and bread. Jolanda will talk about how fungi also catalyse important processes during digestion of feed in ruminants, and how she aims to translate fundamental insights in this area to eventual applications on farm. 

Update: Jolanda could not make the meeting due to school strikes, SRUC's Susannah Bolton was kind enough to stand in!

17th Oct 2023 - We are expanding the team!

We are currently recruiting a research technician! See our 'join us' page for more details and a link to the job advertisement

13th Oct 2023 - We are expanding the team!

We are currently recruiting a PhD student, for a project funded by the Royal Society. See our 'join us' page for more details and a link to the job advertisement

7-8th Oct 2023 - Plants fit for the Future

Jolanda visits the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology to speak on the symposium Plants fit for the Future

2st Oct 2023 - Susana's PhD 

Susana is starting her PhD position today, as part of the a new doctoral programme at SRUC leading to a PhD in Agriculture, Rural and Environmental Studies 

1st Oct 2023 - University Research Fellowship

Today is the start of Jolanda's University Research Fellowship, an exciting change for the team!