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Leopoldo Naranjo Briceño is an Agronomist Engineer and Philosophical Doctor in Molecular Biology and Biotechnology. He graduated Summa cum laude in June 2003 from the School of Biological and Environmental Sciences at the Universidad de León, Spain. Successively, Dr. Naranjo acquired a Postdoctoral Fellowship in the prestigious Instituto de Biotecnología de León, where he developed deep knowledge on genetic and metabolic engineering of filamentous fungi, and discovered novel biotechnological compounds with interesting biological activities for human health.

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In 2005, Dr. Naranjo returned to Venezuela to serve as an Associate Researcher at the Instituto de Estudios Avanzados (IDEA) for more than 10 years and assuming positions of Director of the Energy and Environmental Area, and President at IDEA. His research teams pioneered the field of petroleum biotechnology and environmental biocatalysis in Venezuela. Dr. Naranjo also served as Regional Representative of the Latin American Association of Mycology (ALMIC), Vocal and Vice Gestor of the Iberoamerican Program for Science and Technology (CYTED), and Liaison Officer at the International Centre for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (ICGEB).

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Dr. Naranjo and his family have lived in Ecuador since 2017. He is a member of the Life Science Faculty at the Universidad Regional Amazónica Ikiam (Ikiam), co-Director of the Applied Microbiology Group (MicApp), and the Director of the Microbial Biotechnology Lab. His contributions in science and technology have been focused mainly on the rational use of microbial and genetic diversity to develop environmentally-friendly high-added-value biotechnological products for sustainable development.

Principal Coordinator:
First advanced training on Oxford Nanopore DNA sequencing and data analysis: Discovering the amphibian's cutaneous microbiome and killer-chytrid fungi in the Amazon rainforest.
UNU-BIOLAC / Ikiam  
09.21.2020
Principal Coordinator:
First Course on Introduction to Mycorremediation
GIRO-IRTA / Ikiam / AECID
07.25.2020

UPCOMING EVENTS

Principal Coordinator:
First Course on Introduction to Endomycorrhizal Fungi.
Ikiam / Yachay Tech / ESPOL / CEDIA
08.10.2020
DETAILS
DETAILS

DOCUMENTARY FILM ON PETROLEUM BIOTECHNOLOGY

Petroleum biotechnology could be defined as "the study and rational use of the biodiversity, its genetic, enzymatic, and metabolic resources, to give high-added value to the products and processes of the petroleum industry in its whole-value chain, and to contribute to mitigating the environmental impact of its operational activities" (Naranjo et al., 2019).

MICROBIOME ROLE IN AMAZON AGROFORESTRY SPECIES  

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Role of the plant microbiome in enhancing agroforestry species resilience to abiotic stress. The Apply Microbiology Group is getting the first evidence of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi inhabiting into ancestral Ilex guayusa, an agroforestry plant anciently used by the Amazon indigenous communities as a “holy grail of life” that presents a growing agroeconomic interest due to its high demand in the national and international market.

YEAST ISOLATED FROM NATURAL ASPHALT BLOOM OF AMAZON RAINFOREST

Obtaining extremophilic hydrocarbonoclastic biocatalysts for bioremediation of soils contaminated with recalcitrant crudes in the Ecuadorian Amazon. AECID Project founding. Ikiam University 2020.

THE MYCELYUM NETWORK 

REMAINS STRONG & CONNECTED

 - FANTASTIC FUNGI -

Paul Stamets @paulstamets

Mycologist, Author, Inventor, Teacher, Earthling

www.paulstamets.com

Fantastic Fungi, Official Film Trailer | Moving Art by Louie Schwartzberg

SARS-CoV-2: BIO-BASED MASK USING THE CRISPR/Cas13a TECHNIQUE

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As an innovative development of possible targets to fight against the COVID-2019 pandemic, this proposal aims to use bioinformatics tools and synthetic biology to harness the structural nature of the virus, its own infectious mechanisms, and the virus-host interactions for “tricking, trapping and destroying” SARS-CoV-2.

Are you interesting or encouraged to participate in this proposal? Contact me. 

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