Dr. Conor McClenaghan has been awarded a Human Frontiers Science Program Early Career Research Grant, in collaboration in Dr Harry McClelland (University College London), titled, "Uncharted ocean currents: Exploring the electrical behavior of marine phytoplankton."
Single-celled marine algae produce half of Earth’s atmospheric oxygen and are the trophic entry point for life in the ocean. A suite of animal-like ion channels has recently been discovered in members of the red-lineage algae, and has been shown to underlie electrical excitability – the same phenomenon that drives a wide range of sophisticated dynamic behaviors in humans. However, in algae, the full mechanistic basis of this dynamic behavior and its widespread physiological implications remain poorly understood. The project aims to determine how ion channels work in concert to produce electrical signals in the red-lineage algae and how these ion fluxes impact the chemistry of the cell.