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Belinda Carlene Ferrari is an Australian microbiologist who specialises in the genetics and ecology of soil bacteria and fungi, particularly in polar regions. As of 2016, she is senior lecturer at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in the School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, where she heads the single-cell microbiology laboratory.
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Education
Ferrari gained a Bsc (Hons) from the University of New England in 1994 and a PhD in microbiology from Macquarie University in 2000.
Research
Ferrari's recent research has focused on the diversity of bacteria in the soil. Her studies include both Australia and Antarctica, as well as the Sub-Antarctic Macquarie Island, in collaboration with the Australian Antarctic Division. She and her co-workers have discovered new methods to cultivate soil bacteria in the laboratory, to reveal the breadth of organisms present and to isolate novel and rare bacterial species. Some of her work has studied the effects of diesel pollution on the ecology of Antarctic/Sub-Antarctic soils, including the bacteria and fungi that metabolise pollutants. She is a member of the National Committee for Antarctic Research of the Australian Academy of Science.
She also researches new techniques to detect human pathogens, including Cryptosporidium, Escherichia coli and Giardia, in collaboration with researchers at Macquarie University.
Several of her research papers are highly cited.