Rebekka Janke

Die Inhalte dieser Seite sind leider nicht auf Deutsch verfügbar.

Scientist

MPI for Marine Microbiology
Celsiusstr. 1
D-28359 Bremen
Germany

Raum:	2247
Telefon:	+49 421 2028-8960

[Bitte aktivieren Sie Javascript]

^{I enjoy working across different parts of the research process, from collecting samples in the field to microscopy, experiments, and computational analyses. I am a visual and curious person who enjoys exploring data, testing hypotheses, and connecting detailed observations with the bigger ecological picture. I also enjoy communicating these often hidden interactions through microscopy, illustrations, photography, and figure design.}

RESEARCH INTERESTS

I started my research working on defensive insect symbioses at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany, where I investigated how beneficial bacterial partners are maintained and transmitted throughout host development and metamorphosis. Combining fieldwork, microscopy, molecular biology, chemical ecology, and genomics, I studied how symbionts colonize specialized host structures, protect vulnerable developmental stages against pathogens, and persist across changing host life stages. This work revealed how host morphology and microbial localization are tightly linked in maintaining stable symbiotic associations.

In my current work at the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, I investigate chemosynthetic animal–microbe symbioses and how microbial partners adapt to different host-associated niches ranging from external surfaces to intracellular environments. To address these questions, I combine field sampling and experimental work during research cruises with comparative genomics, pangenomics, transcriptomics, phylogenomics, imaging, and structural prediction approaches. A major focus of my research is understanding the molecular systems underlying symbiont localization, host interaction, and lifestyle diversification, as well as understanding how hosts evolve tissue architectures and cellular adaptations that enable stable microbial associations across different symbiotic lifestyles.

TEACHING & MENTORING

PEER REVIEWED PUBLICATIONS

Ganesan R, Janke RS, Kaltenpoth M, Flórez LV. Colonization dynamics of a defensive insect ectosymbiont. Biology Letters. 2023 May 10;19(5):20230100.

doi: 10.1098/rsbl.2023.0100

Janke RS, Kaftan F, Niehs SP, Scherlach K, Rodrigues A, Svatoš A, Hertweck C, Kaltenpoth M, Flórez LV. Bacterial ectosymbionts in cuticular organs chemically protect a beetle during molting stages. The ISME Journal. 2022 Dec;16(12):2691-701.

doi: 10.1038/s41396-022-01311-x

Behind the paper: Guardians of the progeny: How ectosymbionts protect molting life stages of a beetle against fungal infection

Janke RS, Moog S, Weiss B, Kaltenpoth M, Flórez LV. Morphological adaptation for ectosymbiont maintenance and transmission during metamorphosis in Lagria beetles. Frontiers in Physiology. 2022:1722.

doi: 10.3389/fphys.2022.979200