Post-Doctoral Fellows

Behnam AssadollahzadehDipl. Chem., PhD Massey

Research Interests:

• Chemistry at extreme conditions - Materials at ultra-high pressures from first principles quantum theoretical methods
• Electronic and geometric structure of nano-clusters and their fundamental properties
• Global optimization techniques

Supervisor: Professor Peter Schwerdtfeger

Tatiana EvansPhD Rice, USA

Research Interests:

• 3-manifold theory
• Discrete groups
• Hyperbolic geometry

Supervisor: Distinguished Professor Gaven Martin

Detlev Figgen Dipl. Chem., PhD

Research Interests:

• Adjustment and application of pseudopotentials
• Spin-orbit effects on the spectroscopic constants of molecules containing heavy elements
• Application of the relativistic Fock-space coupled-cluster method
• Parity violation in molecules as possible source for chirality

Supervisor: Professor Peter Schwerdtfeger

Andreas Hermann PhD, Dipl. Phys., Bacc. Mat.

Research Interests:

• Ground- and excited-state properties of extended systems
• Incremental method and many-body decomposition approach to solid state calculations
• Molecular adsorption on solids
• Aqueous systems

Supervisor: Professor Peter Schwerdtfeger

Leon Huynen PhD

Research Interests:

• The evolution of moa.

This remarkable ratite group vanished soon after the settlement of New Zealand by Polynesians late in the 13th century.

Supervisor: Distinguished Professor David Lambert

Christian KostPhD

Research Interests:

My current research focuses on the evolution of complex phenotypes. By using an approach of reverse evolution, in which we have subjected populations of Pseudomonas fluorescens repeatedly to two environments with opposing selection pressures, I try to understand the rules that govern and constrain the evolution of new phenotypes. Analyzing the strains that resulted from the reverse evolution experiment at different levels of biological organisation, I aim at answering the following questions:

• Genotype
  • What were the mutational causes that allowed P. fluorescens to repeatedly adapt to the two contrasting environments?
  • What kinds of genes were affected by mutations (regulatory vs. structural changes)?
    To what extend did parallel evolutionary trajectories occur in the replicate lines?
  • What was the temporal order of the mutations?
  • To what extend is the suite of possible adaptive mutations dependent on the genetic architecture (i.e. determinism) or chance (i.e. stochasticity)?
  • To what extend is the effect of a given mutation determined by the environment (i.e. phenotypic plasticity), the evolutionary history (i.e. epistasis), or an interaction between the two?
  • What molecular mechanism entailed the loss of adaptability in one of the reverse selected line?
• Phenotype
  • How did the phenotype of the reverse selected lines respond to this selection regime?
  • What were the fitness consequences of reverse selection?
    
    Supervisor: Professor Paul Rainey

Elke Pahl Dipl. Chem., PhD Heidelberg

Research Interests:

• Solid state physics: Ground state properties and band structures of extended systems.
• Inclusion of electron correlation by sophisticated quantum-chemical methods (local methods - embedding/ incremental scheme; configuration interaction; coupled cluster approach).
• Theoretical chemistry: Numerical solution of the time-dependent Schroedinger equation (time-dependent wave packet propagation).
• Core-hole spectroscopy.

Supervisor: Professor Peter Schwerdtfeger

Dominik RefardtPhD

Research Interests:

My research focuses on the evolution of infectious disease. How diseases adapt to changes in their environment, is the focus of my current research.

I am currently working with a bacteriophage (a virus that infects bacteria) and its host, the bacterium Escherichia coli. The phage evolves very rapidly and allows me to observe parasite evolution in real time. With this system, I can test how diseases adapt to changes in their environment.

There are two main themes that I am interested in:

• Parasite genetics: Some infectious diseases harm us more, others less. And not everybody becomes sick. Therefore, how do the genetics of the host and the disease agent contribute to the outcome of an infection?
• Parasite evolution: Sometimes hosts are abundant, sometimes they are scarce. Sometimes they defend themselves vigorously, sometimes not. How do infectious diseases evolve in response to these different environmental conditions?

Supervisor: Professor Paul Rainey

Sankar Subramanian PhD

Supervisor: Distinguished Professor David Lambert

Ralf TonnerPhD

Research Interests:

• Solving chemical problems with quantum chemical methods (DFT and ab initio)
• Molecular inorganic chemistry and complex chemistry
• Strong interaction between theory and experiment
• Understanding chemical bonding in molecules
• Interactions of small molecules with TiO2-surfaces and reactivity studies

Supervisor: Professor Peter Schwerdtfeger

Brian Vest PhD

Research Interests:

Transition metal halides have a vast number of uses in industry. Theoretical calculations on the gas-phase transition metal dihalides are also filled with complications. My research project focuses on the dihalides of chromium (CrX2) and iron (FeX2); X = F, Cl, Br, I. The ground state geometries and energies of the monomers, dimers, trimers, and tetramers will be determined and compared with any available experimental/theoretical data. An examination of the clusters' thermodynamic properties will provide clues as to the relative proportions in the gas phase. These calculations will provide an important step for both experimentalists and theoreticians in understanding these deceptively simple molecules.

Supervisor: Professor Peter Schwerdtfeger

Xue-Xian Zhang PhDg

Research Interests:

Like humans, the health and well being of plants is to a large extent determined by the microbes with which they co-exist. While some bacteria are harmful, others have the capacity to promote plant growth. Together with Prof Paul Rainey I am interested in the biology of Pseudomonas fluorescens SBW25 – a bacterium that can promote plant growth. One of the most significant challenges that we face is in understanding the function of P. fluorescens in the plant environment. If P. fluorescens was the size of a bird and possessed similar morphological complexity then progress could be made by observation alone. In the absence of readily observable phenotypes we have taken to detecting changes in patterns of gene expression. Genes expressed in one environment, but not in another are likely to encode traits relevant to the former environment, but not the latter. Understanding the biological significance of these traits and their contribution to ecological performance is our primary aim. Accordingly, much of our current research concerns the regulation, biological function and ecological significance of plant-inducible genes.

Supervisor: Professor Paul Rainey