Biography
Dr. Petra Ditsche completed her undergraduate degrees in biology and hydrobiology in Germany at the University of Düsseldorf and the Technical University of Dresden. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Bonn, where she studied the impact of surface roughness on attachment of running water insects. She was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Bonn, working with Wilhelm Barthlott investigating specialized biological and biomimetic superhydrophobic surfaces, which are able to retain an airfilm underwater. She then became a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Kiel, where she worked with Stanislav Gorb exploring different questions of underwater attachment, antifouling and biomimetics. She then came to the Friday Harbor Laboratories at the University of Washington as a postdoctoral fellow.