Julia Engelmann

Dr. Julia Engelmann is a Tenure-track Scientist in the Marine Microbiology and Biogeochemistry (MMB) department at the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ), specializing in causal network modeling, metagenomics, and bioinformatics. Her research focuses on understanding marine microbial interactions through high-throughput data analysis and computational models, particularly in the North Sea, Wadden Sea, and Antarctic waters, with implications for climate change studies.

• Education: PhD in Bioinformatics (2008) and Diploma in Biology (2004) from German universities.
• Academic Positions: Senior Scientist at NIOZ (2017-present), Assistant Professor (2013-2017), and Postdoctoral roles in computational diagnostics and oncology.

Engelmann applies statistical methods to infer causal relationships between marine microorganisms from observational data, using Bayesian networks and conditional independence analysis. Her work bridges computational biology with experimental validation, aiming to design synthetic microbial consortia for applications like plastic degradation.

She contributes to meta-barcoding and metagenomic analyses, developing pipelines like Cascabel for reproducible sequence data processing. Her recent publications examine methane dynamics, microbial lipid biosynthesis, and plastisphere diversity in coastal and polar systems.

Scientific Awards

• NWO Women in Science Excel (WISE) tenure track award

Engelmann's research integrates environmental factors (temperature, CO2) into microbial interaction models to predict climate change impacts, collaborating with international teams on Antarctic expeditions.