Capture and degradation of micro-plastics by a synthetic biology approach to engineer novel PET-degrading enzyme linked amyloid nano-material

通过合成生物学方法捕获和降解微塑料，以设计新型 PET 降解酶联淀粉样蛋白纳米材料

• 批准号: 2873238
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Kent
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2023 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2873238
• 关键词: Capture; degradation; micro; plastics; synthetic

Accumulation of microplastic waste in the environment is a costly and ongoing societal challenge that can potentially be addressed through the recent discovery of enzymes that are able to degrade Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and recycle it into its constituent building blocks. However, no efficient materials applications currently exist that utilise these enzymes. This project will use a synthetic biology approach to engineer a novel biomaterial based on linking PET degrading enzymes onto functional amyloid fibrils formed from the yeast protein Sup35NM as scaffold. Amyloid fibrils are a type of protein structures with a characteristic fibrous shape. Some amyloid fibrils are well-known to be associated with diseases such as Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, and systemic amyloidosis. However, many amyloid structures are beneficial, or "functional" in that they fill essential biological roles, for example the functional amyloid protein Sup35 from Baker's yeast. Sup35 forms amyloid fibrils in yeast cells and this allows it to functions normally as a molecular switch. Importantly, Sup35 has three parts and only two of these are required to make the amyloid fibrils, these two parts are known as Sup35NM. We intend to replace the 3rd part with enzymes such as PETase which could functionalise the Sup35NM amyloid fibrils and imbue them with PET degrading functionality. Collaborative work in the Xue and von der Haar labs has already generated the first Sup35NM-PETase WT fusion protein, demonstrating the feasibility and the training potential of this project. In this project, the successful PhD candidate will generate new fusion proteins containing recently discovered PETase sequences with mutations that enhance their activity. They will then assemble synthetic filaments as well as meshes, and characterise the structure and the PET degrading activity of the materials made.

微塑性废物在环境中的积累是一项昂贵且持续的社会挑战，最近发现能够降解聚乙烯二苯二甲酸酯（PET）并将其回收到其组成构件中的酶可能会解决。但是，目前尚无使用这些酶的有效材料应用。该项目将使用一种合成生物学方法来设计一种新型的生物材料，基于将宠物降解酶连接到由酵母蛋白Sup355nm形成的功能性淀粉样蛋白原纤维上，作为支架。淀粉样蛋白原纤维是具有特征性纤维形状的蛋白质结构。一些淀粉样蛋白原纤维众所周知，与诸如阿尔茨海默氏病，帕金森氏病和全身性淀粉样变性的疾病有关。但是，许多淀粉样结构是有益的，或“功能性”，因为它们填补了必不可少的生物学作用，例如贝克酵母的功能性淀粉样蛋白SUP35。 SUP35在酵母细胞中形成淀粉样蛋白原纤维，这使其正常起作用作为分子开关。重要的是，Sup35具有三个部分，其中只有两个需要制作淀粉样蛋白原纤维，这两个部分被称为Sup35nm。我们打算用诸如PETASE之类的酶代替第三部分，这些酶可以使SUP35NM淀粉样蛋白原纤维功能化，并用PET降解的功能使它们浸泡。 Xue和von der Haar Labs中的协作工作已经生成了第一个SUP35NM-PTASE WT融合蛋白，证明了该项目的可行性和训练潜力。在这个项目中，成功的PhD候选者将生成新的融合蛋白，该蛋白包含最近发现的PETASE序列，其突变可以增强其活性。然后，他们将组装合成丝和网状丝，并表征所制成的材料的结构和宠物降解活性。