Graduate Students Mini Symposium II 2023

Program

13:15 h Nadya Abbood - AG Bode
"Type S NRPS as a Tool for the Rapid Construction of Engineered Non-Ribosomal Peptide Synthetases"

With the introduction of the SYNZIP (SZ) assisted reprogramming of NRPSs, we established a new engineering method that enables the generation of engineered NRPSs on a large scale. SZs are synthetic leucine zippers with an affinity less than 10 nm, which we attached to various NRPS building blocks, extracted from different biosynthetic gene cluster of the strains Photorhabdus, Xenorhabdus and Bacillus, generating a new synthetic type of NRPSs (type S NPRS). Bioengineering these giant machineries spur chances to access modified peptides with altered physiochemical properties or improved bioactivities.¹Microbial nonribosomal peptide synthetases (NRPS) are multi-modular enzymes that produce many important therapeutic drugs including antibiotics, anti-cancer or immunosuppressive agents.

13:45 h Stefano Lometto - MPRG Hochberg
"Evolution of a fiber-forming enzyme"

Previous investigations showed how a mitochondrial Citrate synthase (CS) in the unicellular eukaryote Tetrahyemna thermophila is capable of forming filamentous structures similar to intermediate cytoskeletal filaments. By using a combination of ancestral sequence reconstruction (ASR) and experimental biochemisrty we aim to elucidate the evolution and the mechanisms underpinning fiber formation. Furthermore, using in vivo confocal microscopy we determine weather such ordered complexity is a product of natural selection or neutral evolution.

14:15 h Lara Connolley - AG Murray
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