Nature features some of our early career researchers this week - 7 May 2015. In the Careers section, Birmingham Fellow, Holly Bik explains how she was transformed from a marine biologist to a highly regarded computational and evolutionary biologist - see Recognition: Build a reputation.
Dr Bik’s long-term research interests lie at the interface between biology and computer science, focusing on high-throughput sequencing as an approach for understanding the biodiversity of (historically neglected) microbial eukaryote taxa. The term 'microbial eukaryotes' generally refers to species with a body size of less than 1 mm.
In the same Nature issue, the News In Focus section (Pint-sized DNA sequencer impresses first users) explains how Josh Quick and Nick Loman have used new high throughput sequencing methods to read the base sequence of Ebola virus genomes less than 48 hours after taking them from patients in Guinea, and the piece describes how Quick flew to Guinea with 3 sequencers packed in his baggage.