Mr Eric Birkholz

MSc Student
Tree Protection Co-operative Programme

Research Interests

In 2008 I did my Honours degree. I worked on closing the gaps in the genome of Pantoea ananatis. These gaps in the genome are region normal where the sequence could not be matched there as there might be a high number of repeats or improper placing of the obtained fragments.

I started my Msc in 2009 under the supervision of Fanus Venter and Bernard Slippers. The Msc project involves the studying of microbial community that occurs in the Sirex noctilio woodwasp larvae and in its surrounding gallery. The methods use will be culturing independent, and will involve the use of pyrosequencing and a microarray chip that identifies based on the 16S rRNA gene. Some culturing dependent identification will also be used just as a base for the main project.