Projects

This project aims to characterise the mechanisms through which microRNAs and small non-coding RNAs act to regulate cellular processes focusing on Naïve CD4 T cell activation and viral replication - namely HIV - and to explore their potential use as a therapeutic co-adjuvant agents or targets.

Amino alcohol moieties are found in highly diverse classes of natural products that are of great importance due to their bioactivity, and they function as chiral building blocks for the synthesis of pharmaceuticals and agrochemicals. The chemical synthesis of stereoisomerically pure amino alcohols is difficult and typically requires uneconomical steps for protective group manipulations. Conventional syntheses in the chemical industry often use hazardous substances, consume large amounts of energy ...

Research programme in the Takato Imaizumi lab, with multiple collaborators. Published in Song et al. Nature Plants 2018; Kinmonth-Schultz et al., in silico Plant 2019.

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INBioPharm - Integrated Novel Natural Product Discovery and Production Platform for Accelerated Biopharmaceutical Innovation from Microbial Biodiversity project will develop a new, generic technology platform for the more efficient discovery of novel bioactive compounds with improved prospects to become medical products. A unique national collection of marine microorganisms at SINTEF/NTNU will be used as the basis for the development of different new, complementary molecular biology, analytical ...

The GMDS project group bundles activities for health-related FAIR data infrastructures in the fields of biomedical research, clinical data management and medical informatics in Germany. It aims at providing a platform for information exchange about best practice for and implementation of FAIR data management in these fields and constructing a network of FAIR data managements providers in these fields. Through bridging between providers and potential users of such data management platforms within ...

A joint NTNU and SINTEF project to establish a knowledge platform on DHA synthesis and lipid accumulation in the native DHA-producing thraustochytrids, and to develop these into high productivity omega-3 fatty acid producing cell factories.

We will systematically analyse large datasets of multiple types to: (i) identify key components affected by age or experimental perturbation; (ii) establish networks of interaction; (iii) develop dynamic computational models based on these networks; (iv) use model selection methods to discriminate between alternative network topologies and generate predictive models. To characterise the data, we will apply an ensemble of methods, including frameworks in R/Bioconductor and toolboxes connected via ...

Biomining is a biotechnological process carried out in many parts of the world that exploits acid loving microorganisms to extract metals from sulphide minerals. One industrial biomining method is called ‘heap bioleaching’ where typically copper containing minerals are piled into very large heaps, acid and microorganisms are added to the top and the soluble metal is collected at the heap base.

The role of the different types of microbes in the process is to speed up metal solubilisation by oxidising ...

Microbial strains used in biotechnological industry need to produce their biotechnological products at high yield and at the same time they are desired to be robust to the intrinsic nutrient dynamics of large-scale bioreactors, most noticeably to transient limitations of carbon sources and oxygen. The engineering principles for robustness of metabolism to nutrient dynamics are however not yet well understood. The ROBUSTYEAST project aims to reveal these principles for microbial strain improvement ...

The MycoSynVac project AIMS at using cutting-edge synthetic biology methodologies to engineer Mycoplasma pneumoniae as a universal chassis for vaccination. Designing a universal Mycoplasma chassis that can be deployed as single- or multi-vaccine in a range of animal hosts. Annually, infections caused by Mycoplasma species in poultry, cows, and pigs result in multimillion Euro losses in the USA and Europe. There is no effective vaccination against many Mycoplasmas that infect pets, humans and farm ...

D-xylose is a major component of lignocellulose and is after D-glucose the most abundant monosaccharide on earth. However, D-xylose cannot be naturally utilised by several industrially relevant microorganisms. On the way to a strong bio-based economy in Europe, this widely available feedstock has to be made accessible for the sustainable microbial synthesis of value-added chemical building blocks to be used in a broad range of applications. The project aims at engineering Corynebacterium glutamicum ...

Exploiting native endowments by re-factoring, re-programming and implementing novel control loops in Pseudomonas putida for bespoke biocatalysis. The EmPowerPutida project aims to engineer the lifestyle of Pseudomonas putida to generate a tailored, re-factored chassis for the production of so far non-accessible biological compounds. Pseudomonas putida is a bacterium with a highly versatile metabolism, including the capability to degrade or produce organic chemicals.

There is an urgent need for novel antibiotics to fight life-threatening infections and to counteract the increasing problem of propagating antibiotic resistance. Recently, new molecular genetic and biochemical tools have provided insight into the enormous unexploited genetic pool of environmental microbial biodiversity for new antibiotic compounds. New tools for more efficiently lifting this hidden treasure are needed to strengthen competitiveness of European industry, as well as for a cost-saving ...

We will contribute to the LiSyM Research Network an open source, freely available and reproducible multiscale model of the human liver from single cell metabolism to whole liver function. The model will be available in existing standards of systems biology, provide standardized interfaces for data integration and be fully annotated to available biological, medical and computational ontologies. All data, models and source code will be shared within the LiSyM Research Network and made available to ...

The workshop focuses on the publication, curation, retrieval, and usage of kinetic data from the reaction kinetics database SABIO-RK and on the use of data in modeling. There will be experience reports from scientists who successfully used experimental data to formulate or verify biological hypotheses with the computer, and you will experience how experimental data can be used with computational models.

Multi-level mathematical modeling of erythropoiesis for optimized expansion of erythroid progenitor cells and improved treatment regimes

Hypoglycaemia and lactic acidosis are key diagnostics for poor chances of survival in malaria patients. In this project we aim to test to what extent the metabolic activity of Plasmodium falciparum contributes to a changed glucose metabolism in malaria patients. The approach is to start with detailed bottom up models for the parasite and then merge these with more coarse grained models at the whole body level.

Translating Systems Virology data into broad-spectrum antiviral Drugs

Systems Biology studies the properties and phenotypes that emerge from the interaction of biomolecules where such properties are not obvious from those of the individual molecules. By connecting fields such as genomics, proteomics, bioinformatics, mathematics, cell biology, genetics, mathematics, engineering and computer sciences, Systems Biology enables discovery of yet unknown principles underlying the functioning of living cells. At the same time, testable and predictive models of complex ...

ZucAt - Sucrose (from german Zucker) translocation in Arabidopsis thaliana. Sucrose translocation between plant tissues is crucial for growth, development and reproduction of plants. Systemic analysis of this metabolic process and underlying regulatory processes can help to achieve better understanding of carbon distribution within the plant and the formation of phenotypic traits. Sucrose translocation from ‘source’ tissues (e.g. mesophyll) to ‘sink’ tissues (e.g. root) is tightly bound to the ...

The Molecular Systems Biology project holds information for reproducing simulation figures in the journal. This can include experimental data files, model files and manuscript information.

Bistable switches are the key elements of the regulatory networks governing cell development, differentiation and life-strategy decisions. Transcriptional noise is a main determinant that causes switching between different states in bistable systems. By using the human pathogen Streptococcus pneumoniae as a model bacterium, we will investigate how transcriptional fidelity and processivity influence (noisy) gene expression and participate in bistability. To study this question, we will use both ...