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SUMMARY:Expanding the Universe of Functional Proteins by Computational Des
 ign
DTSTART:20210218T133000
DTEND:20210218T143000
DTSTAMP:20260427T202852Z
UID:5a0f5a5017355da2575127c3cf662f87abb81c4103ed4365b89b1cc4
CATEGORIES:Conferences - Seminars
DESCRIPTION:Prof. Bruno Correia\, Institute of Bioengineering\, EPFL\, Lau
 sanne (CH)\nBIOENGINEERING SEMINAR\n\nAbstract:\nFinely orchestrated prote
 in activities are at the heart of the most fundamental cellular processes.
  The rational and structure-based design of novel functional proteins hold
 s the promise to revolutionize many important aspects in biology\, medicin
 e and biotechnology. Computational protein design has led the way in ratio
 nal protein engineering\, however many of the designed proteins have been 
 solely focused on structural accuracy and are completely impaired of funct
 ion.\n\nI will present my group’s efforts on the development of novel co
 mputational approaches to predict and design protein function. Specificall
 y\, I will describe a new methodological framework to learn surface patter
 ns displayed in protein structures that can be used to decipher their inte
 ractions with other molecules. I will also present a computational strateg
 y to explore de novo protein topologies\, aiming to solve prevalent proble
 ms in protein design that relate to the lack of optimal structural templat
 es for the design of function. By expanding beyond the known protein struc
 tural space\, our approaches present new paradigms for the rational design
  of functional proteins. I will showcase important applications for our co
 mputationally designed proteins in the domains of vaccine design\, T cell-
 based therapies\, biosensors and synthetic biology.\n\nUltimately\, I anti
 cipate that our research will lead to further improvements in the understa
 nding of protein function and design.\n\nBio:\nThroughout my PhD and postd
 octoral studies I was trained in the United States of America (University 
 of Washington and The Scripps Research Institute). Very early in my scient
 ific career I found out my fascination about protein structure and functio
 n. My PhD studies evolved in the direction of immunogen design and vaccine
  engineering which sparked my interest in the many needs and opportunities
  in vaccinology and translational research. My efforts resulted in an enli
 ghtening piece of work where for the first time\, computationally designed
  immunogens elicited potent neutralizing antibodies. During my postdoctora
 l studies I joined a chemical biology laboratory at the Scripps Research I
 nstitute. In this stage I developed novel chemoproteomics methods for the 
 identification of protein-small molecule interaction sites in complex prot
 eomes. In March 2015\, I joined the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lau
 sanne (EPFL) – Switzerland as a tenure track assistant professor. The fo
 cus of my research group is to develop computational tools for protein des
 ign with particular emphasis in applying these strategies to immunoenginee
 ring (e.g. vaccine and cancer immunotherapy). The activities in my laborat
 ory focus on computational design methods development and experimental cha
 racterization of the designed proteins. Our laboratory has been awarded wi
 th 2 prestigious research grants from the European Research Council. Lastl
 y\, I have been awarded the prize for best teacher of Life sciences in 201
 9.\n\n\nZoom link for attending remotely:\nhttps://epfl.zoom.us/j/83117153
 711\n\nIMPORTANT NOTICE: due to restrictions resulting from the ongoing Co
 vid-19 pandemic\, this seminar can only be followed online.
LOCATION:via Zoom web-streaming only\, due to Covid-19 pandemic https://ep
 fl.zoom.us/j/83117153711
STATUS:CONFIRMED
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