Eric Altermann

Eric Altermann received his PhD at the University of Kaiserslautern, Germany in 1999. His main interest at that time was centred on bacteriophage and bacteriophage development programmes in lactobacilli.

Between 2000 and 2003 he took up a Post Doctoral Fellowship in the group of Prof. Todd Klaenhammer at the North Carolina State University, USA. There he focused on functional genomics using Lactobacillus acidophilus NCFM as a model organism.

Between 2003 and 2006 he took up a Senior Research Scientist position in the same group and was the lead scientist responsible for in silico analyses of the draft and completed Lactobacillus acidophilus NCFM and Lactobacillus gasseri ATCC33323 genomes. Increasing focus on applied bioinformatics led to the development of a number of customized tools for functional genome annotation, comparative analyses and metabolic pathway mapping.

In 2006 he accepted a position as Senior Research Scientist at AgResearch, New Zealand were he is now mainly working on identifying and developing biological avenues to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions originating from New Zealand ruminants and on understanding and optimising fibre degradation in the rumen environment.

Besides these main research activities, he is also maintaining a strong interest in functional genomics and applied bioinformatics of lactic acid bacteria and their bacteriophage.