NEXT CLUB MEETING

Sunday, April 12 at 2:00 pm

LOCATION:

UNM Castetter Hall, Room 55  (MAP)

 Growing a DNA-barcoding Lab in the Southwest
Speakers: David Augustyniak, Dave Cauwels, and Miriam Hernandez

The Southwest Funga Lab was formed to engage the NMMS community in documenting the fungal biodiversity in our region. Organizations such as NAMA, Mycota, FUNDIS, and OMDL have demonstrated that leveraging citizen-science and regional mycological associations can generate robust, high-quality biodiversity datasets, as exemplified by the global mapping initiative called MycoMap. Building on these models, the Southwest Funga Lab will integrate a distributed network of mycologists with a scalable, high-throughput DNA barcoding platform to document fungal diversity across New Mexico and the southwest.

SOUTHWEST FUNGA LAB BIOS

Miriam Hernandez is interested in sustainable agricultural systems that incorporate native plants and microbial communities. She attained a BS in Biology from CSU Fresno and a PhD in plant molecular biology from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. Her graduate research focused on uncovering molecular signaling pathways that enable nitrogen-fixing symbiosis in bacteria and legume plants. She completed her post-doctoral research at LANL in the sustainable production of biofuel using outdoor algae cultivation ponds. Miriam enjoys mountains and mountain biking, looking for pretty flowers, and hanging out with her dog, Bert.

Dave Cauwels is the NMMS Foray Chair and a field trip leader.  He can ID mushrooms, grow mushrooms, and make things with mycelium. He is most interested in collecting DNA data on mushrooms for phylogenetic study, and creating a scalable model for other Myco societies and interested people to execute. 

David Augustyniak is a local mycology enthusiast. He runs a local mushroom farm that focuses on research, citizen science, community education, and open sourcing information. His current passion projects include collecting mushrooms in New Mexico, mapping the fungal genome of the Southwest, and fungal preservation/conservation. He is the operator and creative vision of The Art Farm UnIncorporated (teaching farm), UnI(You and I) Fungi (mushroom farm), Southwest Funga Fest (mushroom festival). and The Grey Area (research lab). David considers himself a lifelong student, learner, teacher, facilitator and family man. He plans to continue to learn every day, spread his passions as far as possible, and create holistic long-lasting systems for the next forever generations!

Kareem Rabbat is an Environmental Engineer earning his degree from the University of Pittsburgh in 2020, with a certificate in Engineering for Humanity. While in Pittsburgh, he worked on several start-ups and conducted multiple research projects involving fungi. After graduating, he worked as a research chemist with Avantor before moving to New Mexico, to work on providing drinking and wastewater services to the Pueblos of New Mexico. He is interested in DNA extraction, sequencing, and validation with the goal of using rare fungi to advocate for wildland protection.

“May the spores be with you!”