Faculty of Medicine
Department of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology
HALIFAX, NOVA SCOTIA | CANADA B3H 4R2 | 1 (902) 494-2480

Claudio H. Slamovits


Assistant Professor
Scholar, Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, Program in Integrated Microbial Biodiversity
Centre for Comparative Genomics and Evolutionary Bioinformatics

9-G1 Tupper
(902) 494-8825 (Office)
(902) 494-7894 (Lab)
Email
Lab Homepage

Research Areas

General interests

Our research interests are generally related with molecular biology and evolution of eukaryotes and their genomes. In particular, we are interested in studying how genomes and their physiology evolve as a result of radical changes in lifestyle such as the acquisition of parasitic and symbiotic relationships. Our research is almost exclusively done on protists (unicellular eukaryotes) as they represent the bulk of the eukaryotic diversity.

Main projects in the lab
Molecular evolution and genomics of alveolates

Renny Lee is using Oxyrrhis marina, an emerging model for dinoflagellate biology to study aspects of molecular biology and genome evolution in this fascinating group of protists.

Gillian Gile carries out a project aimed to generate sequence and ultrastructural data of Colpodellids (a basal apicomplexan lineage) in order to understand the origin and diversification of the infection mechanisms of Apicomplexan parasites.

Shehre-Banoo Malik is working on genomics of Gregarines, a type of protists that parasitize invertebrates. Banoo's project will improve our understanding of the biology and evolution of Apicomplexan parasites.

Genomics of Haplosporidia

A genomic survey of an Haplosporidian parasite (Cercozoa) is ongoing in the hands of Gillian Gile. This project will bring about much needed knowledge about these mysterious but important protists that affect seriously fisheries industry in Canada and worldwide.

Other topics

Quantitative PCR for Oxyrrhis marina genome structure and gene expression in Bigelowiella natans (Hugo Lai, Gillian Gile)

Meiosis and DNA repair in Oxyrrhis marina (Banoo Malik)

Collaborations

We are also carrying our projects in collaboration with these friends:

John Archibald (Dalhousie), Alastair Simpson (Dalhousie), Brian Leander (UBC), Patrick Keeling (UBC), Nicolas Corradi (Ottawa), Mary Beth Saffo (Harvard/MBL), Santiago Mora-García (IIB, Buenos Aires)

On these topics:

  • Gregarine genomics (Leander)
  • Analysis of EST data of Oxyrrhis marina (Keeling)
  • Whole genome projects of Bigelowiella natans (Cercozoa) and Guillardia theta (Cryptophyta)(Archibald/Keeling)
  • Protein targeting and substitution rates in Chlorarachniophytes (Archibald/Keeling)
  • Molecular data and ultrastructure of Colpodellids (Simpson)
  • Meiosis in arbuscular mycorrhizae (Corradi)
  • Mutualistic Apicomplexas (Saffo)
  • Evolution of Ser/Thr Phosphatases in plants and algae (Mora-García)

Claudio Slamovits's citations

Slamovits Lab Website

Keywords:
DNA/RNA sequencing, bioinformatics, cloning, PCR, real-time PCR, phylogenetics

Graduate Students


Renny Lee PhD Program

Postdoctoral Fellows


Gillian Gile University of British Columbia, Vancouver
Shehre-Banoo Malik Department of Biology, University of Iowa, Iowa City IA USA

Honours Students


Mandy McConnell Biochemistry/Music

Lab Personnel


Susana Breglia Visiting Student (University of British Columbia)
Sarah Dowler Research assistant
Hugo Lai Research assistant

Publications

  1. Corradi, N. and Slamovits, C.H., (2011) The intriguing nature of microsporidian genomes Briefings in Functional Genomics In press: [PubMed]
  2. Slamovits, C.H., Okamoto, N., Burri, L., James, E. and Keeling, P.J. , (2011) A bacterial proteorhodopsin proton pump in marine eukaryotes. Nature Communications 2:183:
  3. Gile, G. and Slamovits, C.H., (2011) Phylogenetic position of Lophomonas striata Bütschli (Parabasalia) from the hindgut of the cockroach Periplaneta americana Protist In press: [PubMed]
  4. Halary, S.*, Malik, S.-B.*, Lildhar, L., Slamovits, C.H., Hijri, M. and Corradi, N. (*equal contibutions), (2011) Conserved meiotic machinery in Glomus spp., a putatively ancient asexual fungal lineage. Genome Biology and Evolution 3:950-958 [PubMed]
  5. Lowe, C.D., Keeling, P.J., Martin, L.E., Slamovits, C.H., Watts, P.C. and Montagnes, D.J.S., (2010) Who is Oxyrrhis marina? Morphological and phylogenetic studies on an unusual dinoflagellate. Journal of Plankton Research doi: 10.1093/plankt/fbq110:
  6. Saffo, M.B., McCoy, A.M., Rieken, C. and Slamovits, C.H., (2010) Nephromyces, a beneficial apicomplexan symbiont in marine animals Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 107 (37):16190-16195 [PubMed]
  7. Slamovits, C.H. and Keeling, P.J., (2010) Contributions of Oxyrrhis marina to molecular biology, genomics and organelle evolution of dinoflagellates Journal of Plankton Research doi: 10.1093/plankt/fbq153:
Last modified: 2011-09-01