School of Biomedical Sciences is pleased to invite you to join the following seminar:

Date: 20 December 2023 (Wednesday)
Time: 10:30 am – 11:30 am
Venue: Lecture Theatre 1, G/F, William M.W. Mong Block, 21 Sassoon Road

Speaker: Professor Roman Jerala, Head, Department of Synthetic Biology and Immunology, National Institute of Chemistry
Talk Title: Synthetic biology for the design of new protein assemblies and mammalian cell regulation

Biography

Professor Roman Jerala is head of the Department of Synthetic Biology and Immunology, National Institute of Chemistry, Ljubljana, Slovenia and a professor at the University of Ljubljana. He is a member of the Slovenian Academy of Arts and Sciences, EMBO member and member of Academia Europaea. He obtained PhD in chemistry at the University of Ljubljana and was a postdoc at the University of Virginia USA. Upon return to Slovenia, he moved to the National Institute of Chemistry where he established a Department with a focus on synthetic biology and molecular immunology. His group contributed to the advancement of synthetic biology with innovative ideas in the area of mammalian synthetic biology and protein design. The department he leads covers the range from atoms to preclinical studies, with high-resolution structural, biophysical, microscopy and cell techniques. Among his most notable achievements are the invention of the coiled-coil protein origami, innovative types of synthetic regulation for mammalian cells in ~ 40 publications in journals with IF>10, including>20 in the Nature family journals. He received the highest national and several international awards such as the Datta prize and an ERC Advanced Grant. Recently his group is active in translational medicine using synbio and genome engineering tools and obtained EU and national funding for the establishment of the Centre of Excellence for Technologies of Gene and Cell Therapy.

Abstract
Principles of synthetic biology can be used to engineer biological and biomimetic systems in order to achieve new interesting properties and understand the function of natural systems. We can now construct new protein folds, introduce new mechanisms of regulation and design signal processing in cells, which is needed to modulate cellular response. Modularity can be applied to design new types of protein folds, based on coiled-coil (CC) building modules, introduce allosteric regulation of diverse proteins, enhance transcriptional regulation, and design proteolysis- and CC-based logic gates that can respond within minutes. The results presented in this talk will demonstrate the design of synthetic biology tools for the modular design of new protein scaffolds and regulation of biological systems and diverse biotechnological and therapeutic applications.

References: Ljubetič et al. Nat. Biotechnol. (2017); Lebar T, et al. Nat Chem Biol. (2018); Fink et al. Nat Chem Biol. (2019); Lebar et al. Nat. Chem. Biol. (2020); Praznik et al., Nat.Commun. (2023); Rihtar et al., Nat.Chem.Biol. (2023); Plaper et al., Cell Discovery (in press); Ramšak et al., Nat.Commun. (in press).

ALL ARE WELCOME

Should you have any enquiries, please feel free to contact Miss Angela Wong at 3917 9216.