dr Daniel Méndez-Sánchez

Scientific interests

My passion and interests lie in unveiling the secrets of the diversity of protists, mainly ciliates. Their incredible diversity reflects a rich evolutionary history marked by adaptation and colonization of various ecosystems, where interactions with other living forms play a pivotal ecological role. As a morphologically and behaviorally complex lineage, ciliates—with their varied lifestyles—are exceptional models for exploring symbioses across ecosystems, including anoxic habitats, through microscopic and molecular lenses; in other words…

“I am driven to uncover the evolutionary and ecological secrets embedded in the diversity of ciliates, whose complexity and interactions make them perfect gems in the obscure and unwritten book of life.”

Project participations

• Currently – Researcher in the SYMBIOSTART project “Unravelling the establishment of endosymbiosis: quest for intermediate evolutionary stages among microbial eukaryotes,” Principal Investigator Dr hab. Anna Karnkowska
• 2021 – 2023 Principal investigator in START/SCI/095 (Charles University, Czech Republic) project “Methanogenic Archaea as endosymbionts of unrelated free-living anaerobic protists”
• 2020 – 2022 Researcher in the Grant Agency of the Czech Republic (GAČR project no. 19-19297S) project “New approaches to the important symbiosis: Diversity and dynamics of the relationship of anaerobic protists and intracellular methanogenic archaea”

Internships

• Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology, Okinawa, Japan, supervisor Dr. Filip Husník. September 2022- January 2023
• Ocean University of China, Qingdao, China, supervisor Dr. Xiaozhong Hu, October 2015

Awards

• 2024 – Vakovlk Award for significant PhD publication record, Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, Charles University

Publications