Pioneering scientist Ed DeLong elected to the European Academy of Microbiology
Edward DeLong
Edward DeLong, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa Professor Emeritus of Oceanography and pioneering marine microbiologist, was recently elected as a Fellow of the European Academy of Microbiology (EAM). Election to the EAM Fellowship recognizes outstanding scientific achievement and leadership in microbiology.
DeLong is considered a trailblazer in the field of metagenomics, the study of all genetic material from all organisms in a particular environment, whose research has transformed understanding of the ocean’s microbial life. His work advanced innovative gene cloning and sequencing, allowing scientists to study complex marine microbial communities and their role in the environment without the use of traditional microbial cultures.
“I was thrilled to hear the news about Ed’s election to the European Academy of Microbiology, a well-earned honor,” said David Karl, UH Mānoa oceanography professor and DeLong’s long-time colleague and co-director of both the UH Mānoa Center for Microbial Oceanography: Research and Education and the Simons Collaboration on Ocean Processes and Ecology. “Ed and other newly-elected members represent the second golden age of microbiology, one centered on microbial oceanography and ecology.”
Scientific breakthroughs
Early in DeLong’s career, using methodologies developed by his postdoctoral research advisor Norm Pace to identify microbes “in the wild”, they discovered two new lineages of a major microbial group called Archaea that were not thought to live in seawater, were abundant everywhere–from Station ALOHA in the Pacific Ocean to Antarctica, and from the sea surface to the seafloor.
Later, new methods that DeLong’s group adapted from the Human Genome project to study microbial ecology led to the discovery that most bacteria in the upper ocean can use sunlight to generate biochemical energy using proteins called opsins. This finding, perhaps his group’s most famous breakthrough, revealed a widespread, previously unknown solar energy-gathering mechanism in the ocean, with significant implications for the global carbon and energy cycles.
“Oceanic Archaea and bacterial rhodopsins were phenomena that no one knew existed in ocean waters–but we now know they are virtually everywhere” DeLong shared. “Applying new genome-centric technologies to microbial ecology and oceanography, much like the original invention of the microscope, allowed us to “see” more of nature’s mysteries, which are not so easy to decipher in the invisible microbial world.”
Distinguished career
In the course of his distinguished career, DeLong has held faculty and research positions at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, University of California-Santa Barbara, Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Massachusetts Institute of Technology and University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology, where he co-directed C-MORE and SCOPE. DeLong’s election to the European Academy of Microbiology adds to a long list of accolades, including elected fellowship in the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Academy of Microbiology, and the European Molecular Biology Association.
“To be recognized and honored by world-renowned microbiologists of the European Union was unexpected, and very humbling,” DeLong said. “I believe that scientific disciplines like microbiology should have no geographic or cultural boundaries–yet in today’s political landscape there are increasing challenges to free and open international collaborations. To me, this makes recognition by the European Academy of Microbiology all the more potent of an honor.”
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