Research Interests

I love exploring unique relationships between microbes in complex communities and understanding how engineering decisions influent microbial behaviors. I predominantly work with wastewater nitrification, but have experience with carbon cycling in wetland microbial communities, extremophiles from hotsprings, microbial communities on drinking water granular activated carbon biofilters, and iron cycling microbial communities.

Hampshire College

Coming Fall 2024

Georgia Tech

Dr. Juliet Johnston (she/they) is an ASEE eFellows Postdoctoral Researcher at the Georgia Institute of Technology studying the transcriptomic expression of nitrifying bacteria in engineered environments with Dr. Ameet Pinto.

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

Previously, she was a postdoctoral researcher at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory studying spatial arrangements of carbon cycling organisms in wetlands with Dr. Xavier Mayali and Dr. Mari Winkler. She tracked single cell activity using stable isotope enrichments via nanoSIMS. During this time, they were a part-time lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley, teaching a graduate course on Environmental Biological Processes (CE211b).

University of California Berkeley

During my postdoc at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, I was a part-time lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley, teaching a graduate course on Environmental Biological Processes (CE211b).

University of Minnesota

In 2020, Dr. Johnston completed her PhD at the University of Minnesota in Environmental Engineering studying how the activated sludge microbiome fluctuates thought the seasons with Dr. Sebastian Behrens. They did this with the support from the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship Program. While working on her PhD, Julie founded Queer Science, an outreach organization which aims to connect LGBTQ+ high school students with LGBTQ+ scientists (queerscience.umn.edu).

University of St. Thomas

During my PhD, I was a completed the Preparing Future Faculty 1-year program and was mentored with Dr. Carolyn Zeiner. Afterwards, I was hired as an Adjunct Professor at the University of St. Thomas in the biology department teaching an introductory course and lab.

Undergraduate

She received her BS in Environmental Engineering with a minor in Women and Gender Studies at Clemson University in 2014. Prior, in 2010 she received an AA in Liberal Arts at Hillsborough Community College.

She enjoys binging tv, crafts, hiking, and is always ready to show you pictures of her 11-year-old husky-mix dog, Harper.