Fore more information

De novo protein structures and assemblies for synthetic biology

Derek Woolfson

Schools of Chemistry and Biochemistry, & BrisSynBio

University of Bristol, UK

Nature has almost certainly only shown us a glimpse of what is possible structurally and functionally with polypeptide chains. To help us explore past the confines of natural protein structures, and into what has been termed the dark matter of protein space, we have developed a toolkit of de novo peptides (1). These can be used as building blocks for the rapid construction of new protein structures and supramolecular assemblies. This talk will demonstrate the utility of this approach to make nanoscale protein pores (2, 3), and peptide-based nanocages (4). Potential applications of these structures and materials span nanoscience, synthetic biology and biotechnology.

1-A Basis Set of de Novo Coiled-Coil Peptide Oligomers for Rational Protein Design and Synthetic Biology
JM Fletcher, AL Boyle, M Bruning, GJ Bartlett, TL Vincent, NR Zaccai, CT Armstrong, EHC Bromley, PJ Booth, RL Brady, AR Thomson, and DN Woolfson
ACS Synthetic Biology 6, 240-250 (2012)

2-A de novo peptide hexamer with a mutable channel
NR Zaccai, B Chi, AR Thomson, AL Boyle, GJ Bartlett, M Bruning, N Linden, RB Sessions, PJ Booth, RL Brady and DN Woolfson
Nature Chemical Biology 7, 935-941 (2011)

3-Computational design of water-soluble alpha-helical barrels AR Thomson, CW Wood, AJ Burton, GJ Bartlett, RB Sessions, RL Brady and DN Woolfson

Science 346, 485-488 (2014)

4-Self-assembling cages from coiled-coil peptide modules.
JM Fletcher, RL Harniman, FRH Barnes, AL Boyle, A Collins, J Mantell, TH Sharp
Antognozzi, PJ Booth, N Linden, MJ Miles, RB Sessions, P Verkade, and DN Woolfson
Science 340, 595-599 (2013)