Hellenic Scientific Society MIKROBIOKOSMOS
Mikrobiokosmos (microbial world in Greek) is an Hellenic Scientific Society established in 2007 with mission the research, exploration and exploitation of the microbial national resources. Its primary focus is to be the national forum for new knowledge and advanced research in the areas of environmental microbiology, microbial ecology of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, food microbiology, microbial biotechnology, synthetic biology and synthetic microbial ecology, host-microbiome interactions, bioenergy and cell factories for production of novel bioproducts but also addresses fundamental research in microbiology using model microorganisms. Mikrobiokosmos tries to bring together fundamental research on microbiome with applications in agriculture (plant microbiome), food production and safety, environmental clean up and biodepuration of effluents.
The Society of Mikrobiokosmos has more than 150 members and associated members from all Universities, all National Public Research Centers and main Industrial actors from Greece and Cyprus and it aspires to become an international hub for Microbiologists from the Balkan and Eastern Mediterranean Region.
The role of the Society is to facilitate the collaboration and exchange of ideas between its members, to inspire students and young professionals in microbiology, to support them with grants and to promote scientific actions through the organization of seminars, meetings, summer schools, workshops and its biannual international conference in Greece.
The Hellenic Scientific Society of Microbiokosmos is a member of the Federation of European Microbiological Societies (FEMS) and of the International Union of Microbiological Societies (IUMS) and its members act as national ambassadors for the International Society for Microbial Ecology (ISME) and the American Society of Microbiology (ASM). The Society organizes webinars, annual summer schools and other training events, offers benefits and scholarships to young members and acts as a national hub to support and promote microbiome research in Greece.
Society
Board of Directors
Chrysoula Tassou
Secretary
Dr. Chrysoula Tassou is Research Director in Food Microbiology/Safety in the Institute of Technology of Agricultural Products (ITAP) of the Hellenic Agricultural Organization (HAO) – DIMITRA, Deputy Director, President of the Scientific Council of ITAP and deputy member of the Scientific Council of HAO-DIMITRA. During the period 2019-2023 she has been President of the Hellenic Scientific Society Mikrobiokosmos. Her research interests are: Food Microbiology-Safety, Microbial diversity in foods, Fermented Functional foods – Probiotics, Food Bio-preservation, Rapid methods in food spoilage assessment. She has implemented successfully as Coordinator or as Scientific Leader, more than 50 competitive EU and national research projects, attracting significant funding for ITAP. She is editor and peer-reviewer in international scientific journals, member of scientific societies and expert evaluator/reviewer for national and European research projects. She is member of the working groups of “Food Safety”, “Food Processing and Packaging” and “Nutrition, Health, Consumers” of the Greek Technological Platform “Food for Life”, member of the European platform. She has collaborated with the University of Patras and Univ. of West Attica teaching in undergraduate and postgraduate level and continues being Supervisor or Committee member for PhD and MSc students at Cranfield University (UK), Reading University (UK), Agricultural University of Athens, Democritus University of Thrace and Aegean University.
Evangelos Topakas
President
Evangelos Topakas is a Professor in the School of Chemical Engineering, National Technical University of Athens and Associate visiting Professor in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Natural Resources Engineering of Luleå University of Technology in the field of Industrial Biotechnology. He leads the Industrial Biotechnology and Biocatalysis (IndBioCat) group. Dr. Topakas is at the forefront of industrial enzyme discovery, focusing on utilizing residual biomass for 2nd generation liquid biofuels and high-value compounds within the realm of Biorefineries. His innovative approach involves employing conventional and modern omics technologies, along with Genetic and Protein Engineering tools, to investigate and modify biocatalytic systems in bacteria and fungi for the production of energy, chemicals, and materials from waste biomass. Notably, his recent work involves leveraging knowledge from plant cell wall degrading enzymes to combat plastic pollution by converting and upcycling synthetic polymers.His interdisciplinary research activities transcend conventional boundaries, requiring collaboration among engineers, biochemists, molecular biologists, and physicists. Dr. Topakas assumes leadership roles as the Editor-in-Chief for Biotechnology for the Environment (Springer Nature) and the Biocatalysis section of Catalyst (MDPI). He also serves as an Associate Editor for Biotechnology for Biofuels (Springer Nature), Frontiers in Biotechnology and Bioengineering –Section of Industrial Biotechnology (frontiers), and Frontiers in Microbiology – Section of Systems Microbiology (frontiers).
Anthi Karnaouri
Member
Anthi Karnaouri is an Assistant Professor of Laboratory of General and Agricultural Microbiology, with a research expertise in Molecular Biotechnology of Microorganisms and Microbial Fermentation Processes. Her research interests include (i) Enzyme Biocatalysis (cloning, heterologous expression, production and characterization of novel biocatalysts involved in the degradation of lignocellulosic biomass & development of enzyme-mediated biocatalytic processes for the production of added value compounds from industrial by-products and pollutants) and (ii) Microbial Fermentation processes (both in small-scale cultures and bioreactors for the production of useful products, including proteins, mycelial biomass, lactic acid, ω-3 fatty acids and nanocellulose). A. Karnaouri is a Biologist, holding a BSc from University of Athens (UoA) and a MSc in “Μicrobial Biotechnology” from the same University. She obtained a PhD in Biotechnology from the School of Chemical Engineering at the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) and subsequently worked as a postdoctoral researcher at Luleå University of Technology (LTU), Sweden, and at NTUA. She has served as Principal Investigator on three research projects funded by the Hellenic Foundation for Research and Innovation (H.F.R.I.), including the currently ongoing project MycoVal (2025–), which focuses on the utilization of basidiomycetes for plastic polymer degradation. She is currently supervising three PhD theses and has supervised Master’s theses within the postgraduate program Biotechnology at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (UoA), as well as undergraduate theses at the Agricultural University of Athens (AUA).
Alexandra Meziti
Member
Alexandra Meziti is an Assistant Professor in Marine microbiology in the department of Marine Sciences at the University of the Aegean. Her main interests and research lie on aquatic microbes ecology and their interactions with aquatic animals as well as with their environment. She has worked a lot on the study of microbial diversity using modern molecular techniques such as metabarcoding and metagenomics.
Agapi Doulgeraki
Member
Agapi Doulgeraki is serving as an Assistant Professor in the Laboratory of Food Microbiology and Hygiene, Department of Food Science and Technology in Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. She received a degree from the Department of Food Science and Technology of Agricultural University of Athens (2007) and her Ph.D. degree from Cranfield University (UK) (2011). She has carried out postdoctoral research at the Agricultural University of Athens (AUA) and the Hellenic Agricultural Organization – DIMITRA (ELGO-DIMITRA). In 2017, she was hired as an Assistant Research Scientist (Researcher Grade D) in Institute of Technology of Agricultural Products (ELGO-DIMITRA), and in 2020 she was promoted at Assistant Researcher position (Researcher Grade C). She has taught in University of the Aegean (2012-2013) and Agricultural University of Athens (2017) and co-supervise/supervised MSc students or PhD candidates of University of Malta and AUA and she is serving as External referee of PhD program Course of Food Science of the University of Naples Federico II (Italy). She is Associate editor in the Frontiers in Microbiology journal and Italian Journal of Food Science and she was a substitute member in Cost Actions (CA18113, FA1202). Her research interests include topics related to the subject of Food Microbiology and Molecular Food Microbiology.
Christina Pavloudi
Member
Christina Pavloudi is a Data Scientist / Post Doctoral Researcher at the European Marine Biological Resource Centre (EMBRC). She holds a PhD in Marine Sciences from Ghent University (Belgium) and University of Bremen (Germany), an MSc in Environmental Biology – Management of Terrestrial and Marine Resources from the University of Crete and a BSc in Biology from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. She has also carried out postdoctoral research at the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research (HCMR), the George Washington University (GWU) and the Centre de Recherche Insulaire et Observatoire de l’Environnement (CRIOBE). Overall, she has vast experience in microbial ecology, metagenomics and eDNA metabarcoding and she has worked with samples from various matrices (e.g. sediments, water, invertebrate and vertebrate symbionts/pathogens) and habitats (e.g. steam vents, hot springs, coastal ecosystems, deep sea). Her research interests include Microbial Ecology, Marine Biology and Ecology, Marine Biodiversity, Functional Diversity and Bioinformatics. She was the coordinator of an EOSC-Life funded project on creating a workflow for marine Genomic Observatories data analysis (40 k€), of the RECONNECT project (Interreg V-B “Balkan-Mediterranean 2014-2020”, co-funded by the European Union (85%) and National Funds of the participating countries (15%), 356 k€) and she also had obtained a Post Doctoral Scholarship from State Scholarships Foundation (IKY) (22 k€). She has been involved in >20 research and education projects, including FP7, H2020, Horizon Europe, ASSEMBLE projects and EU COST Actions. She has published 42 peer-reviewed scientific articles and participated in several international conferences and workshops. [H-Index 15 (Scopus), H-Index 18 (Google Scholar) (assessed: 03/01/2024)].
Savvas Genitsaris
Treasurer
Savvas Genitsaris is an Assistant Professor in Aquatic Microbial Ecology in the Faculty of Biology, School of Sciences, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. His main research focus is the investigation of molecular and functional diversity of microbes from various environments, e.g. marine, freshwater, air, wastewaters, using classical microscopy tools and modern high-throughput sequencing technologies. Currently, he is member of the editorial board of the journal Diversity.
Affiliated Societies
Aims:
Microorganisms (ISSN 2076-2607; https://www.mdpi.com/journal/microorganisms) is a scientific, international, peer-reviewed, open access journal of microbiology, published monthly online by MDPI.
Microorganisms provides an advanced forum for studies related to prokaryotic and eukaryotic microorganisms, viruses and prions. It publishes original scientific research articles, comprehensive reviews, comments, commentaries, perspectives, etc. Our aim is to encourage scientists to publish their experimental and theoretical results in as much detail as possible.
Scope:
- Microbial physiology
- Microbial ecology
- Microbial genetics
- Evolutionary microbiology
- Systems microbiology
- Medical microbiology
- Pharmaceutical microbiology
- Industrial microbiology
- Agricultural microbiology
- Microbial biotechnology
- Food microbiology
- Environmental microbiology
More detailed information of topics and subject areas can be found at https://www.mdpi.com/journal/microorganisms/sections
The Hellenic Society Mikrobiokosmos (MBK), the Spanish Society for Nitrogen Fixation (SEFIN) and the Society for Microbial Ecology and Disease (SOMED) are affiliated with Microorganisms