Ryan Paerl

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Bio

As a native of eastern North Carolina, I grew up surrounded by picturesque marine ecosystems and became interested in the biology and chemistry occurring within them. After completing a BS in biology, I became fascinated by marine bacterioplankton, esp. cyanobacteria, and nutrient cycling – and received a PhD in Ocean Sciences from UC Santa Cruz, as well as worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and University of Copenhagen. Currently, I am an Associate Professor in the Marine, Earth, and Atmospheric Sciences Department at NC State leading a marine & aquatic microbiology research lab, alongside teaching courses in marine biology and microbiology. I am also a faculty member of the NCSU Microbiology Program. Ongoing research within the Paerl Lab at NCSU focuses on oceanic vitamin B1 (thiamin) cycling and its role in plankton interactions; cyanobacterial diversity, metabolism, and ecosystem impacts in freshwater to marine habitats; and novel applications of flow cytometry – including sorting flow cytometry (https://microfacs.wordpress.ncsu.edu/).

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Area(s) of Expertise

My research interests focus on improving our current understanding of marine/aquatic microbial ecology, physiology, metabolism, diversity, and biogeography. Problems and questions related to nutrient cycling (production, assimilation, and transformation) are of particular interest. Students in my lab will conduct in-field and/or laboratory-based experiments and employ traditional (cell isolation, culturing) as well as modern molecular techniques (qPCR, PCR, nucleic acid sequencing, isotopic tracing) to test hypotheses.