Project Title: Molecular, environmental and applied microbiology
Project Goal: Creation of a modern laboratory of molecular, environmental and applied microbiology at Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University
Organizational and infrastructural transformations:
Goals and Objectives
Research Areas:- Search for new and optimization of existing antibiotics and bioactive components based on peptides, functional analysis of adaptive bacterial defense systems
- Search for new CRISPR-Cas systems for the development of new genetic engineering technologies, analysis of the influence of stochastic effects on the operation of restriction-modification systems and toxin-antitoxin systems that determine bacterial persistence
- Description of new transcriptional enzymes of bacteriophages
Project Goal: Creation of a modern laboratory of molecular, environmental and applied microbiology at Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University
Scientific Results
- Unique RNA polymerases of giant bacteriophages were characterized for the first time. A three-dimensional structure model was obtained for one of them, which is currently the first model of a non-canonical transcription enzyme.
- Using acoustic force spectroscopy, single-molecule data were obtained on the inhibition of bacterial RNA polymerase by new lasso peptides.
- A complete biochemical and structural characterization of a new antimicrobial thiazole-oxazole modified microcin (TOMM), klebsazolicin, which inhibits bacterial growth by blocking translation, has been conducted. Using biochemical, genetic, and X-ray crystallographic methods, it was established that klebsazolicin inhibits the elongation of the growing peptide chain by plugging the ribosomal tunnel.
- Unique algorithms for analyzing fluorescence microscopy images were developed, enabling high-quality data on cell-to-cell variation in bacterial defense system components (restriction-modification and CRISPR-CAS systems) and determining how these variations affect individual cell fate.
Organizational and infrastructural transformations:
- High-value equipment was acquired (AB Sciex 5800 MALDI TOF-TOF mass spectrometer, a suite of equipment for single-molecule studies based on a surface acoustic wave spectrometer).
- Two laboratory rooms for molecular microbiological research have been equipped, providing Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University with new capabilities for biological research.
Education and personnel retraining
- Defenses: 2 PhD dissertations at the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, 6 Candidate of Sciences dissertations, 15 graduation theses.
- Laboratory participants include: 9 postgraduate students, over 20 students from Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University, 3 students from St. Petersburg State University, and 10 students and postgraduates from the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology.
- Internships at leading Russian and international research and education centers in the field of study were organized for 20 young scientists and postgraduate students of the Laboratory.
- An open lecture by Nobel laureate Professor Shinya Yamanaka, "Recent Advances in Research and Applications of Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells," was organized.
- Four seminars featuring invited foreign scientists were organized.
- New training courses have been developed: the "Single-molecule methods in biological research" discipline for postgraduate students of the Laboratory of Molecular Microbiology, and the "Fundamentals of Molecular Biology" educational laboratory course for students of the Department of Biophysics at Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University.
- Practical training courses on methods of molecular environmental and applied microbiology were conducted for 12 young employees and postgraduate students from external organizations.
- Guided tours of the Laboratory were conducted for schoolchildren.
- The Satellite Young Scientists School on Genomics and Metagenomics of Extremophiles was organized, featuring leading global biologists: Konstantin Severinov, Mikhail Gelfand, Dennis Bamford, Michael Terns, and Armen Mulkidjanian.
Cooperation
- Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology (Russia): implementation of the joint project "Adeno-associated virus-delivered nucleases for a new generation of gene therapy drugs for hereditary diseases" with the participation of industrial partner BIOCAD JSC and financial support from the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation.
- Rutgers University (USA), Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA), University of Texas (USA), Pasteur Institute (France): joint research, scientific internships for young scientists
Website: https://nanobio.spbstu.ru/department/laboratoriya_molekulyarnoy_mikrobiologii/
Contact person: Mikhail Alekseevich Khodorkovsky, Director of the Nanobiotechnology Research Complex
Address: 29 Politekhnicheskaya St., Hydrocorpus-2, Room 108
Phone: +7 (812) 552-98-09
Email: hodork_ma@spbstu.ru
Contact person: Mikhail Alekseevich Khodorkovsky, Director of the Nanobiotechnology Research Complex
Address: 29 Politekhnicheskaya St., Hydrocorpus-2, Room 108
Phone: +7 (812) 552-98-09
Email: hodork_ma@spbstu.ru
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