photosynthetic microbes
Welcome to the website of the junior professorship of synthetic biology of photosynthetic organisms at the Matthias Schleiden Institute!
Our research focuses on developing and utilising synthetic biology principles to improve photosynthetic cell factories. Our interest is to advance photosynthetic host chassis as a sustainable alternative towards biotechnological applications. To achieve this, we are using metabolic and genetic engineering techniques as well as molecular biology and biochemical methods. We are mainly working with various different cyanobacteria and at occassion with eukaryotic algae. Apart from their plethora of proposed applications, we are also interested in unravelling fundamental cell biological processes (such as protein trafficking). Additionally, we want to gain more insights into the processing of environmental signals in co-cultures and communities of these organisms.
On this website you can find news and information about research and teaching in the group.
Information
The group recently moved internally, you can now find us at Philosophenweg 12 (just above the Botanical Garden). Please also direct all mail to the new address.
Follow us on X (Twitter) for more news: @SynBioJazzExternal link
- October 2024: Term starts and the group is growing - welcome to our MSc thesis project student Nils and Sophie, who will support our work as a Hiwi!
- September 2024: There were many occasions for cake this month and a lot of changes in the group. Our master students Janine und Nolan finished their lab work and will now write their theses. Our Bachelor student Simon also finished his work and already handed in this thesis - congratulations! Furhtermore we have a new lab member - say hi to Rea, who joins us for her MSc thesis project!
Cake with Cyanobacteria Pattern baked by Simon
Image: MV
Participation at ICRC 2024 (Bielefeld)
Image: JAZZ- 25. September 2024: The EXCRETE Workflow Paper for Exoproteomics in Cyanobacteria has now been published in Communications BiologyExternal link Congratulations to the first authors David Russo und Denys Oliinyk!
- September 16th – 18th 2024: Next stop was Bielefeld for the 13th International Cebitec Research ConferenceExternal link. This was the first international conference our PhD student Chris participated in . He presented his project in a poster and Julie gave a talk on Sayali's recent findings on metabolic engineering of Synechocystis for pigment biosynthesis (watch out for the preprint!). Again - many familar faces and interesting insights into recent developments in the field of algal biotechnology. We will happily join again in 3 years time!
- 13. September 2024: The Boehringer Ingelheim FoundationExternal linkwill support our research for 2 years within an Exploration Grant - thanks a lot and we are already looking forward to kicking off the project!
Participation at EWBC 2024
Image: -- September 3rd – 6th 2024: This month we have been busy attending conferences! The first one was the "12th European Workshop on The Cell Bioloy of Cyanobacteria"External link in Sevilla. Our PhD student Sayali showcased her work on membrane integration of cytochrome P450s in cyanobateria in a poster presentation and Julie gave a talk on our nanofilament technology in cyanobacteria. A very nice conference with many familiar faces that will definitely need to new collaborations!
- At the same time, our Master student Janine was joining the MiCom 2024 conference in Jena showing the results of her Master thesis in a Poster presentation.
- July, 24th 2024: The book chapter on "Photosynthetic Proteins in Cyanobacteria: from Translocation to Assembly of Photosynthetic Complexes", which is part of the book Endosymbiotic Organelle AcquisitionExternal link (edited by Steven D. Schwartzbach, Peter G. Kroth and Miroslav Oborník) has now been published.
- July, 11th 2024: Today the group had good reason to celebrate! Alexandra Schirmacher successfully defended her PhD thesis with the title "Novel synthetic biology approaches for next-generation cyanobacterial cell factories". She is the first PhD graduate from the group (more to come!). Congratulations Alex and great that you will keep working with cyanobacteria!
Group Photo PhD Defense Alexandra Schirmacher
Image: AZ- July, 2nd 2024: Today we welcomed Prof. Daniel Ducat (Michigan State University) and our collaborators Dr. Bin Lai and coworkers (UFZ Leipzig) to our institute seminar. The guest lecture by Danny gave exicing news on carboxysomes and their role in central carbon metabolism. We had many great discussions and new ideas we will definitely follow up on. Thanks a lot for visiting Jena!
Group Photo Visit Danny Ducat in Jena
Image: Alexandra Furch
Conference Attendees 22. Mitteldeutsche Pflanzenphysiologietagung
Image: JAZZ- April 2024: This month, Simon is joining us. He will be completing his BSc thesis with us until the end of the summer. Welcome to the group!
- February, 23rd-24th 2024: This year we hosted the "22. Mitteldeutsche Pflanzenphysiologietagung" in Jena together with Alexandra Furch de (Plant Physiology). The whole lab actively participated with oral presentations, posters and as session chairs. We thank the many participants from Halle, Leipzig, Dresden and Jena for a great Meeting. We would also like to thank the German Society for Plant SciencesExternal link, Profillinie Life as well as BioLabTecExternal link for supporting this meeting. We are particularly proud of our MSc student Janine Keller, who won the poster prize. Congratulations! If you want to know more about the conference, you can take a look at the official conference reportExternal link on the DBG website.
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Poster Prize Award Janine KellerCongratulations to our MSc student Janine Keller for winning the poster prize!
- January 2024: Thanks to Paul D'Agostino (TU Dresden) for being our guest at the institute seminar. His talk about his work on discovering and expressing cyanobacterial biosynthetic gene cluster was great!
2023
- December 2023: Our nanofilament paper in cyanobacteria is now published in ACS Nano: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acsnano.3c08600External link
- October 2023: Happy Halloween! We had some fun carving pumpkins and welcoming new members to the group: two MSc students (Janine and Nolan) and Chris joining us a for a PhD.
Group Picture AG Zedler October 2023
Image: DAR- September 2023: This month we are all busy travelling and networking! Alexandra, Sayali and Miriam are joining the Cyano2023 External linkmeeting in Kassel with a talk and two posters showcasing their work. You can meet Julie at the GASB 7 External linkin Freiburg at the annual conference of the German Society for Synthetic Biologie.
- August 2023: We are looking for a PhD student to join our team starting November 2023. More information can be found here.
- August 2023: The first corresponding-author paper of Dr. Jan Klein (Steroid Biosynthesis de, Plant Physiology) about progestogen and androgen biosynthesis in plants was published in the journal New Phytologist. The junir professorship was involved and we say congratulations! The original research article can be found hereExternal link.
- June 2023: Our PhD student Sayali presented her work on strategies for improving cytochrome P450 expression in cyanobacteria at the "15th International Symposium on Cytochrome P450 Biodiversity & Biotechnology" in Copenhagen.
PhD student Sayali at P450 Symposium in Copenhagen
Image: privat
Visit of Anna Matuszyńska in Jena
Image: Tobias Pfennig- June 2023: Junprof. Dr. Anna Matuszyńska and her PhD student Tobias Pfennig were our guests within the institute seminar. We are looking forward to collaborations and say thank you for a great talk and interesting discussions!
- June 2023: two papers were published: (1) Cell surface composition, released polysaccharides, and ionic strength mediate fast sedimentation in the cyanobacterium Synechococcus elongatus PCC 7942. Environ Microbiol. DOI:10.1111/1462-2920.16426External link and (2) the Interlaboratory Study we were a part of: Interlaboratory Reproducibility in Growth and Reporter Expression in the Cyanobacterium Synechocystis sp. PCC 6803. ACS Synth Biol DOI:10.1021/acssynbio.3c00150External link.
- February 2023: new preprint from a long-term collaborative project and our PhD student Alexandra's first research paper in the group: nanofilament assembly in cyanobacteria: Self-assembly of nanofilaments in cyanobacteria for protein co-localizationExternal link
Synthetic Biology of Photosynthetic Organisms
Philosophenweg 12
07743 Jena
Google Maps site planExternal link
Postal address:
Friedrich Schiller University Jena
Matthias Schleiden Institute
Synthetic Biology of Photosynthetic Organisms
Philosophenweg 12
07743 Jena
Germany