Karla Heidelberg

About

Karla Heidelberg is a biological oceanographer with a diverse research portfolio that includes marine microbial ecology, zooplankton ecology, and the impacts of human activities on coastal ecosystems. Her work combines biology, molecular techniques, and environmental science to better understand factors that structure marine ecology. She is based at the University of Southern California, where she contributes to the academic community through her research and teaching.

Research topics

• Chemistry
• Oceanography
• Geology
• Biology
• Ecology
• Environmental science
• Environmental chemistry
• Geography

Selected publications

• Probing the evolution, ecology and physiology of marine protists using transcriptomics

  Nature Reviews Microbiology · 2016-11-21 · 232 citations

  review
  PublisherDOI

• A tale of two mixotrophic chrysophytes: Insights into the metabolisms of two Ochromonas species (Chrysophyceae) through a comparison of gene expression

  PLoS ONE · 2018-02-13 · 68 citations

  articleOpen access

  Ochromonas spp. strains CCMP1393 and BG-1 are phagotrophic phytoflagellates with different nutritional strategies. Strain CCMP1393 is an obligate phototroph while strain BG-1 readily grows in continuous darkness in the presence of bacterial prey. Growth and gene expression of strain CCMP1393 were investigated under conditions allowing phagotrophic, mixotrophic, or phototrophic nutrition. The availability of light and bacterial prey led to the differential expression of 42% or 45-59% of all genes…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Autotrophic and heterotrophic acquisition of carbon and nitrogen by a mixotrophic chrysophyte established through stable isotope analysis

  The ISME Journal · 2017-05-19 · 66 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Collectively, phagotrophic algae (mixotrophs) form a functional continuum of nutritional modes between autotrophy and heterotrophy, but the specific physiological benefits of mixotrophic nutrition differ among taxa. Ochromonas spp. are ubiquitous chrysophytes that exhibit high nutritional flexibility, although most species generally fall towards the heterotrophic end of the mixotrophy spectrum. We assessed the sources of carbon and nitrogen in Ochromonas sp. strain BG-1 growing mixotrop…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Changes in gene expression of Prymnesium parvum induced by nitrogen and phosphorus limitation

  Frontiers in Microbiology · 2015-06-24 · 58 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  Prymnesium parvum is a globally distributed prymnesiophyte alga commonly found in brackish water marine ecosystems and lakes. It possesses a suite of toxins with ichthyotoxic, cytotoxic and hemolytic effects which, along with its mixotrophic nutritional capabilities, allows it to form massive Ecosystem Disruptive Algal Blooms (EDABs). While blooms of high abundance coincide with high levels of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P), reports of field and laboratory studies have noted that P. parvum toxi…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Single-cell transcriptomics of small microbial eukaryotes: limitations and potential

  The ISME Journal · 2017-01-06 · 57 citations

  articleOpen access

  Single-cell transcriptomics is an emerging research tool that has huge untapped potential in the study of microbial eukaryotes. Its application has been tested in microbial eukaryotes 50 μm or larger, and it generated transcriptomes similar to those obtained from culture-based RNA-seq. However, microbial eukaryotes have a wide range of sizes and can be as small as 1 μm. Single-cell RNA-seq was tested in two smaller protists (8 and 15 μm). Transcript recovery rate was much lower and randomness in…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Genomic Analysis of Unculturable Microbial Eukaryotic Plankton of the San Pedro Ocean Time Series Station

  NSF · $500k · 2007–2011

Frequent coauthors

• Joanne Emerson

  University of California, Davis

  20 shared

• David A. Caron

  University of Southern California

  17 shared

• Jillian F. Banfield

  University of California, Berkeley

  14 shared

• John F. Heidelberg

  University of Southern California

  13 shared

• Luis E. Eguiarte

  Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México

  12 shared

• Valeria Souza

  Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México

  12 shared

• David M. Karl

  University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa

  11 shared

• Eric E. Allen

  Scripps Institution of Oceanography

  10 shared

Education

• PhD, Marine-Estuarine-Environmental-Science (MEES)

  University of Maryland

  1999

• B.A.

  Maryville College

  1988

Similar researchers at University of Southern California

• David J. Bottjerh-83
• Joe Arvaih-42