Steven Hallam

Steven Hallam is a University of California Santa Cruz and MIT trained molecular biologist, microbial ecologist, entrepreneur, and innovator. With over 20 years of experience in field and laboratory research and innovation at disciplinary interfaces, Hallam is an Associate Professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at the University of British Columbia, Canada Research Chair in Environmental Genomics and Canadian Institute for Advanced Research Scholar in integrated microbial biodiversity, a program dedicated to studying the molecular, morphological and community complexity of the microbial world.

Following an undergraduate degree from Sarah Lawrence College concentrating on Biology and Religion, Steven spent several years working as an oncology research technician at the Montifiore Medical Center. He went on to receive a PhD from the University of California Santa Cruz where he conducted research on developmental regulation of neuronal asymmetry and synaptic remodeling. Motivated by this experience in network dynamics, Steven became a postdoctoral research fellow at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute and later, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he studied microbial ecology and environmental genomics.

Steven’s current academic research intersects microbial ecology, synthetic biology and bioinformatics with specific emphasis on the creation of functional screens and computational tools that reveal hidden metabolic powers of uncultivated microbial communities. His laboratory has developed MetaPathways, a modular annotation and analysis pipeline to predict metabolic interactions from environmental sequence information. Other research areas include the use of microfluidic digital chip technology for single-cell genome sequencing and biosensor development for environmental monitoring and enzyme discovery. He was recently elected a fellow in the American Association for the Advancement of Science for distinguished contributions to the fields of environmental genomics and microbial ecology.

Dr. Hallam has filed provisional patents applications on platform screening technology for biosensor development and biorefining process improvements through his faculty position with the University of British Columbia. He recently co-founded MetaMixis, a synthetic biology company that uses this screening technology to discover and evolve small molecules and industrial catalysts from uncultivated microbial communities inhabiting natural and engineered ecosystems.

Steven is an underwater enthusiast. A former NAUI SCUBA instructor and scientific diver he has had the opportunity to ride in deep-sea submersibles exploring slow spreading centers and interact with remotely operated vehicles probing hydrocarbon seeps on continental margins.