NSF-EC: Biochemistry of Algal Adhesives

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This award to University of California Santa Barbara is to isolate and characterize adhesive glycoproteins from different algae species, and to determine molecular weight, shape and primary sequence of these proteins and their subunits. With this award Professor John Waite will evaluate the chemical functionality of the adhesive proteins, especially the determination of post-translational modifications and comparison of these modifications to those observed in adhesive proteins from mussels. Modeling of the adhesive proteins and studying methods to control cross-linking reactions during the adhesive curing process will be carried out. European scientists, who will be collaborating with this project, will provide algal adhesive proteins, haloperoxidase and cDNA-deduced protein sequences for these studies.This multi investigator project with six university research teams, two biotech companies and European scientists will isolate, characterize, mimic, and bulk-produce algal adhesive proteins with the ultimate aim of developing pharmaceutical adhesives and to mitigate fouling. Many analytical methods including tandem mass spectrometry with collision-induced decomposition will be used to determine the primary sequence of these proteins and their subunits. This NSF project is co-funded by the Office of Multidisciplinary Activities, and Divisions of Chemistry (Advanced Materials), Materials Research (Solid State Chemistry), International Office (Western Europe) and Civil and Mechanical Systems (Surface and Material Design) as a Cooperative Activity in Materials Sciences between the National Science Foundation and the European Commission (NSF 01-105). This project is being carried out in collaboration with the Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research Institute; Technion University, Israel; University of Birmingham, England; Gothenburg University, Sweden; Roscoff Marine Station, France; and industrial collaborators from Iceland (Bio-Gels Pharmaceuticals Ltd) and Israel (Biota Ltd).