Our laboratory focuses on four primary research areas. The first focus involves the study of biosynthetic pathways for commodity fuels and high-value products from select bacteria, cyanobacteria and algae. Our second focus is on bacteria and cyanobacteria capable of biological nitrogen fixation (BNF) and the role these species play in the biological nitrogen cycle. Our third focus is related to the production of extracellular fermentable sugars from phototrophs (algae) and our final focus is related to organisms that are capable of biodegrading commodity plastics and other polymers in the environment.