Elufisan T.O. / MICROBIOLOGIST CV ↓
Research · Case studies

Five projects, one
question: what's in there,
and what is it doing?

Case 01 · USDA-ARS · 2024–2026

Sequencing foodborne parasites.

As an ORISE postdoctoral fellow at the USDA-ARS Environmental Microbiology and Food Safety Laboratory in Beltsville, MD (2024–2026), I worked with Dr. Jenny Maloney on whole-genome sequence analysis of Cryptosporidium and Giardia duodenalis. These two parasites cause a heavy share of waterborne and foodborne gastrointestinal disease worldwide; genome-resolved epidemiology lets us assign outbreaks to subtypes, trace transmission, and understand drug-target variation in a way that microscopy and single-locus typing cannot. The fellowship concluded February 2026 — I am now seeking the next role to continue this line of work.

CryptosporidiumGiardia duodenalisWhole-genome sequencingUSDA-ARS Beltsville
Case 02 · Centro de Ciencias Genómicas · bioRxiv 2024

The genes that make a virulent lipid.

During my first postdoc at the Centro de Ciencias Genómicas, UNAM (Cuernavaca), I worked with Otto Geiger's group to map the gene set required to synthesise bacterial sphingolipids that provoke virulence. The finding reshapes how we think about cell-surface lipids as pathogenicity signals — and opens a tractable target set for interventions.

SphingolipidsGeneticsBacterial virulence
See the preprint →
Case 03 · PeerJ 2020

A Stenotrophomonas that eats oil.

Stenotrophomonas sp. Pemsol was isolated from crude-oil-contaminated soil in Mexico. Its genome carries an unusually complete set of dioxygenases and monooxygenases for polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon degradation. This single-organism study anchored my thesis and led to the SVIA2 complete-genome report in Microbiology Resource Announcements (2019).

PAH degradationEnvironmental microbiologyComplete genome
Case 04 · Braz. J. Microbiol. 2021

Undoing the dye, bacterially.

Textile effluent from Tepetitla carries a load of azo dyes that resist conventional treatment. Two Stenotrophomonas strains we isolated decolorise and then mineralise those dyes — a promising candidate for bioaugmented effluent treatment. The paper documents the kinetics and enzymology; the next step is a pilot.

Applied microbiologyIndustrial biotechAzo dyes
Case 05 · IJSEM 2022

A predator for the soil.

Bdellovibrio reynosensis sp. nov. was described from a Mexico soil sample. Bdellovibrios are small Gram-negatives that hunt other Gram-negatives — including some human and livestock pathogens. We are currently characterising their prey range and genome diversity with an eye on biocontrol applications.

Predatory bacteriaBiocontrolTaxonomy
Read the archive

Twenty-three peer-reviewed outputs
across twelve years.

Open publications →