Engineering the Isoprenoid Pathway in Bacteria and Yeasts
Event details
| Date | 27.05.2019 |
| Hour | 12:15 |
| Speaker | Prof. Greg Stephanopoulos, Department of Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA (USA) |
| Location | |
| Category | Conferences - Seminars |
JOINT CHEMICAL and BIOENGINEERING SEMINAR
(sandwiches served)
Abstract:
Isoprenoids are a large class of, mainly plant-derived, natural compounds. Also known as terpenoids. They comprise more than 55,000 compounds and constitute one of the largest classes of metabolites in nature. Their importance stems from their diverse uses in fields like nutrition, cosmetics and medicine, with some of these compounds, such as taxol and artemisinin, currently being used as pharmaceuticals for the treatment of cancer and malaria, respectively. Numerous other compounds are under investigation for other applications. Despite strong interest in these molecules, current methods of production rely on extraction from plant sources, which are inefficient, unreliable and costly. As a result, effective drugs cannot be deployed at scale especially in developing countries. In recent years microbial metabolic engineering has made great advances in facilitating the biosynthesis of isoprenoids. In this talk, I will outline general principles of metabolic engineering for isoprenoid production inEscherichia coli and the oleaginous yeast Yarrowia lipolytica that yielded record levels of taxadiene accumulation. A new pathway bypassing central carbon metabolism will be described along with methods to overcome the hydrophobic nature of these compounds which prevents their intracellular accumulation to very high levels. Due, in part, to these advances, a pipeline of isopreboid products has been constructed for their cost effective production by microbial fermentation.
Bio:
Gregory N. Stephanopoulos was the 2016 AIChE President and the W. H. Dow Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT. After obtaining his chemical engineering doctorate at Univ. of Minnesota, he taught at Caltech before joining MIT in 1985. His research focuses on metabolic engineering — the engineering of microbes to convert them to chemical factories for the production of fuels and chemicals. He has co-authored or edited five books, 380 papers, and 50 patents, and supervised more than 110 graduate students and post-docs. He is editor-in-chief of two journals, and serves on the editorial boards of seven scientific journals and the advisory boards of five chemical engineering departments. Among his 15 major awards are AIChE’s Food, Pharmaceutical, and Bioengineering (FPBE) Div. Award, Wilhelm Award, and Founders Award. In 2002 he was elected to AIChE’s Board of Directors. He is an AIChE Fellow and Trustee of the AIChE Foundation. He is also a Member of the National Academy of Engineering and Corresponding Member of the Academy of Athens.
(sandwiches served)
Abstract:
Isoprenoids are a large class of, mainly plant-derived, natural compounds. Also known as terpenoids. They comprise more than 55,000 compounds and constitute one of the largest classes of metabolites in nature. Their importance stems from their diverse uses in fields like nutrition, cosmetics and medicine, with some of these compounds, such as taxol and artemisinin, currently being used as pharmaceuticals for the treatment of cancer and malaria, respectively. Numerous other compounds are under investigation for other applications. Despite strong interest in these molecules, current methods of production rely on extraction from plant sources, which are inefficient, unreliable and costly. As a result, effective drugs cannot be deployed at scale especially in developing countries. In recent years microbial metabolic engineering has made great advances in facilitating the biosynthesis of isoprenoids. In this talk, I will outline general principles of metabolic engineering for isoprenoid production inEscherichia coli and the oleaginous yeast Yarrowia lipolytica that yielded record levels of taxadiene accumulation. A new pathway bypassing central carbon metabolism will be described along with methods to overcome the hydrophobic nature of these compounds which prevents their intracellular accumulation to very high levels. Due, in part, to these advances, a pipeline of isopreboid products has been constructed for their cost effective production by microbial fermentation.
Bio:
Gregory N. Stephanopoulos was the 2016 AIChE President and the W. H. Dow Professor of Chemical Engineering at MIT. After obtaining his chemical engineering doctorate at Univ. of Minnesota, he taught at Caltech before joining MIT in 1985. His research focuses on metabolic engineering — the engineering of microbes to convert them to chemical factories for the production of fuels and chemicals. He has co-authored or edited five books, 380 papers, and 50 patents, and supervised more than 110 graduate students and post-docs. He is editor-in-chief of two journals, and serves on the editorial boards of seven scientific journals and the advisory boards of five chemical engineering departments. Among his 15 major awards are AIChE’s Food, Pharmaceutical, and Bioengineering (FPBE) Div. Award, Wilhelm Award, and Founders Award. In 2002 he was elected to AIChE’s Board of Directors. He is an AIChE Fellow and Trustee of the AIChE Foundation. He is also a Member of the National Academy of Engineering and Corresponding Member of the Academy of Athens.
Practical information
- Informed public
- Free