Dr. Suzana Leles

Biography

Suzana Gonçalves Leles has an oceanographer background with a focus on microbial ecology. Her research explores the diverse lifestyles of marine microbes, their distribution, and their impact on ecosystem functioning. She employs models and data to study the ecological niches and biogeography of protists, and how microbes influence nutrient cycling at regional and global scales. Her work addresses the ecological and evolutionary responses of microbial communities in a rapidly changing ocean. By combining theoretical frameworks, numerical modeling, and empirical data, she investigates the fine-scale cellular processes that shape ecosystems and drive large-scale biogeochemical patterns. Dr. Leles conducted postdoctoral research at the University of Southern California as a Simons Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow. She earned her Ph.D. from Swansea University in the United Kingdom, and she holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil.

Research Interests