I-Corps: Combinatorial phage display for the development of specific, single target biopesticides against invasive plant pathogens

I-Corps：组合噬菌体展示，用于开发针对入侵植物病原体的特异性单靶点生物农药

• 批准号: 2139617
• 负责人: Daniel Schachtman
• 金额: $ 5万
• 依托单位: University of Nebraska-Lincoln
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2021-08-01 至 2024-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2139617&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Corps; Combinatorial; phage; display; development

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project will be the establishment of a process to develop and rapidly create environmentally friendly biological fungicides to solve worldwide problems related to fungal plant pathogens. These pathogens can threaten agricultural crops worldwide. Bacterial and fungal pathogens are diverse and evolve natural resistance to both pesticides and resistance genes incorporated into crops by plant breeders. Because of the widespread occurrence of fungal diseases on crop plants and the negative effects of fungicides on a range of organisms, there is a need to develop more environmentally friendly approaches to controlling fungal plant pathogens. Agricultural industries worldwide have problems with fungal diseases which reduce yield, lead to the destruction of crops, and result in substantial lost revenue. This project aims to establish a platform to develop and rapidly deploy biological fungicides to reduce the impact that fungal pathogens have on agricultural crops.This I-Corps project will develop the use of combinatorial phage display for the rapid screening, development, and deployment of specific, single target biopesticides against new and invasive plant pathogens.  This innovation was demonstrated to be a powerful tool for selecting peptides with an affinity to many different types of biological materials including small molecules and whole cells. It is anticipated that using phage display will rapidly identify peptides that are effective at interfering with pathogen function. Previous work indicates that roughly 50% of peptides selected with this method bind strongly to a specific plant pathogen and have a negative impact on pathogen virulence. The project will use artificial intelligence-based computational approaches to optimize peptide design and efficacy. It is anticipated that the proposed biopesticides will not persist in the environment and will be unlikely to be toxic to humans or other organisms because of their specificity to  the targeted  pathogens.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

I-Corps项目更广泛的影响/商业潜力将是建立一个开发和快速创造环境友好型生物杀菌剂的程序，以解决与真菌植物病原体有关的世界性问题。这些病原体可以威胁世界各地的农作物。细菌和真菌病原体种类繁多，对杀虫剂和植物育种者整合到作物中的抗性基因产生自然抗性。由于作物上真菌病害的广泛发生和杀菌剂对一系列生物的负面影响，有必要开发更环保的方法来控制真菌植物病原菌。世界各地的农业都有真菌病的问题，这会降低产量，导致农作物破坏，并导致大量收入损失。这个项目旨在建立一个开发和快速部署生物杀菌剂的平台，以减少真菌病原体对农业作物的影响。这个i-Corps项目将开发组合噬菌体展示技术，用于快速 筛选、 开发和部署针对新的和入侵的植物病原体的特定的、 单一目标生物杀虫剂。 这项创新被 证明是一种 强大的工具，用于选择与许多不同类型的生物材料包括小分子和全细胞具有亲和力的多肽。预计利用噬菌体展示技术可以快速鉴定出能有效干扰病原体功能的多肽。以前的工作表明，用这种方法筛选的多肽中，大约有50%与特定的植物病原菌强烈结合，并对病原菌的毒力产生负面影响。该项目将使用基于人工智能的计算方法来优化多肽设计和功效。预计建议的生物杀虫剂将不会在环境中持续存在，而且不太可能对人类或其他生物产生毒性，因为它们对目标 病原体具有特异性。这一裁决反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。