Dr. Rob Edwards has had three papers published this year in the journal Nature. This is truly a remarkable achievement. Nature is one of the premier scientific journals in the world. Since its beginning in 1869, SDSU faculty have published a total of only about 70 papers in Nature; it is rare for the whole College of Sciences to have more than one or two per year.
The first paper in Nature was about the analysis of viruses on stromatolites, which are really old microbial communities:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/nature06735.html
He also helped with a comparison of microbial communities in coastal oceans:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v451/n7179/abs/nature06513.html
The third paper is an analysis of more sequences than anyone has ever seen before:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature06810.html
This was covered in
FOX News: http://tinyurl.com/23ww82 and MSNBC: http://tinyurl.com/2nggjb
Dr. Edwards was also featured in the San Diego Union Tribune and New York Times for his paper in PLoS One about the effect of microbes on coral reefs.
Link to paper:
http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0001584
Link to coverage:
NYTimes: http://tinyurl.com/yp5noy
SD Union Tribune: http://tinyurl.com/3dqm7x [this one has a photo of Dr. Edwards]