Olga Sanchez received her PhD degree in biological sciences from the Universitat Autnoma de Barcelona (Spain) in 1996. Her research began with the study of the physiology of photosynthetic bacteria and went on to the utilization of complex microbial biofilms in packed reactors for the treatment of contaminated effluents. In 2007 she became an aggregate teacher at the Department of Genetics and Microbiology of the Universitat Autnoma de Barcelona, and presently, her investigation focuses on the application of molecular techniques for the characterization of the diversity of different natural microbial communities, including marine environments or wastewater treatment systems. These methodologies include clone libraries, FISH (Fluorescence In Situ hybridization), fingerprinting techniques such as DGGE (Denaturing Gradient Gel Electrophoresis), and next-generation sequencing technologies.