Meet The Team
Associate Professor, Marine Science
Manuel Ignacio Aranda Lastra
Biological and Environmental Science and Engineering Division (BESE)
Center membership, Red Sea Research Center
https://rsrc.kaust.edu.sa/people/detail/manuel-aranda-lastra-ph.d
Faculty
https://www.kaust.edu.sa/en/study/faculty/manuel-aranda
Orcid
Research Interests
Prof. Aranda is an evolutionary biologist with a strong background in functional genetics and coral reef genomics. His group studies the molecular underpinnings of the cnidarian-algal symbiosis and its environmental stress-related breakdown using functional genomics and genetics approaches. Furthermore, they are interested in how corals use the ability to modify their genomes through epigenetic mechanisms in order to adapt to changing environmental conditions.
FocusAndTechnologyAreas
- Postdoctoral Fellow, King Abdullah University of Science & Technology, 2009
- Postdoctoral Fellow, Institute for Genetics, University of Cologne, 2007
- Ph.D., Institute for Genetics, University of Cologne, 2006
- Diploma, Institute for Genetics, University of Cologne, 2001
- E. Howells, D. Abrego, Y. J. Liew, J.A. Burt, E. Meyer, M. Aranda (2021)."Enhancing the heat tolerance of reef-building corals to future warming". Science Advances, 2021 Aug 20;7(34):eabg6070. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.abg6070
- A. Nand, Y. Zhan, O.R. Salazar, M. Aranda, C.R. Voolstra, J. Dekker (2021). "Chromosome-scale assembly of the coral endosymbiont Symbiodinium microadriaticum genome provides insight into the unique biology of dinoflagellate chromosomes". Nature Genetics53, 618–629 (2021). doi.org/10.1038/s41588-021-00841-y(Cover Story!)
- Y.J. Liew, E. Howells, X. Wang, C.T. Michell, J. Burt, Y. Idaghdour,M. Aranda (2020). "Intergenerational epigenetic inheritance in reef-building corals". Nature Climate Change (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-019-0687-2
- Y. Li, Y.J. Liew, G. Cui, M.J. Cziesielski, N. Zahran, C.T. Michell, C.R. Voolstra, M. Aranda (2018). "DNA methylation regulates transcriptional homeostasis of algal endosymbiosis in the coral model Aiptasia". Science Advances Vol. 4, no. 8, eaat2142 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aat2142
- Y. J. Liew, D. Zoccola, Y. Li, E. Tambutté, A.A. Venn, C. T. Michell, G. Cui, E.S. Deutekom, J.A. Kaandorp, C.R. Voolstra, S. Fôret, D. Allemand, S. Tambutté, M. Aranda (2018). "Epigenome-associated phenotypic acclimatization to ocean acidification in a reef-building coral". Science Advances Vol. 4, no. 6, eaar8028, DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.aar8028
