HBCU-UP RIA: Isolation and identification of novel chemical entities from marine microorganisms

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The Historically Black Colleges and Universities-Undergraduate Program (HBCU-UP) Research Initiation Awards (RIAs) provide support to STEM junior faculty at HBCUs who are starting to build a research program, as well as for mid-career faculty who may have returned to the faculty ranks after holding an administrative post or who need to redirect and rebuild a research program. Faculty members may pursue research at their home institution, at an NSF-funded Center, at a research intensive institution or at a national laboratory. The RIA projects are expected to help further the faculty member's research capability and effectiveness, to improve research and teaching at his or her home institution, and to involve undergraduate students in research experiences. With support from the National Science Foundation, Fisk University will conduct research aimed at isolating novel chemical entities from marine micro-organisms. This project represents a new area of research (Marine Natural Chemistry) at Fisk University, a small liberal arts HBCU with over 94% under-represented minority undergraduates in STEM. This project will be used to enhance teaching and learning at Fisk across several disciplines (chemistry, biology, mathematics (statistics) and computer science) and thus, provide experiential learning to a wide undergraduate student population. In addition, Fisk University is transforming its STEM pedagogies to include authentic research in course-associated laboratories, where this work will serve as a model in both organic and analytical chemistry courses, thus having a broader impact on the STEM majors, their professional development, and retention.The goal of the proposed study is to identify new bioactive chemical entities from a newly isolated yellow-cream Gram-negative, rod-shaped Pseudomonas stutzeri bacteria (strain 35M3) whose identity and uniqueness was confirmed from 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis. The specific aims of this project are to: 1) to use high information density analytic tools to identify novel chemical entities from the newly identified strain of Pseudomonas 35M3 and the impact on this strain's metabolome by co-culture experiments (with Gram-positive bacteria Rhodococcus wratislaviensis, Gram-negative bacteria Escherichia coli, and fungus Saccharomyces cerevisiae separately) or after antibiotic selection; and 2) extend bioactivity analysis beyond the typical assessment of bacterial and mammalian cell cytotoxicity to include the impact of these novel compounds on dopamine neuron development and protection against induced dopamine neurodegeneration using C. elegans as a model system. This study has the potential to identify 16S rRNA gene sequences of newly identified microbial strains. The data generated from this work will inform the design of future experiments that explore other metabolomes and/or dissect cellular pathways central to normal homeostasis of cell development, signaling, cell-cell communication, and other processes. This project will be conducted in collaboration with Vanderbilt University.