Biodiversity, biogeography and evolution of marine eukaryotes is my field of research. Microalgae constitute an integral part of all photic habitats on the planet. My research aims at assessing the diversity of these algae and uncovering the unknowns. High throughput sequencing (HTS) and other parallel sequencing tools allow us to uncover hidden diversity, which goes unnoticed with the classical microscopic monitoring. In order to unveil this hidden diversity using HTS, the first and foremost important thing is the availability of a taxonomically validated reference dataset. Hence, my research focuses on bridging the gap between classical taxonomy and molecular tools, which allows generating reference barcodes. A reference barcode for a species is generated by collecting, cultivating and characterizing the species of interest by means of for instance microscopy and sequencing of particular DNA marker regions, called barcodes. These barcodes can then be used to identify and assess the species diversity in the HTS metabarcoding approaches. At present, my research focuses on assessing the harmful algae diversity in aquaculture farms. My personal interest has developed towards changes in microalgal assemblages with time, where I focus my interest on how species are evolving and how anthropogenic activity have impacted on the community and ecosystem as a whole.