MICROMEMICROMEJ. Tamames, V. de Lorenzo et al

Environmental Microbiology Environmental Microbiology LaboratoryLaboratory

CNB-CSIC, Madrid, Spain

Main goals:

Understanding how bacteria which inhabit natural niches sense and process multiple environmental signals into distinct transcriptional responses –both at the level of single cells and as a community.

Exploring the possibility of programming bacteria for deliberate environmental release aimed at biodegradation of toxic pollutants or as biosensors for monitoring the presence of given chemicals.

Developing tools for the prediction of metabolic outcomes by simulation of single cell or community metabolism

Molecular Environmental Microbiology Laboratory

Centro Nacional de Biotecnología-National Center of Biotechnology, Madrid, Spain

Head: Dr. Victor de Lorenzo

Genetic Traps

Mining biodegradative activities out of complex metagenomes, by coupling the rise of the reaction products to transcriptional regulators that activate expression of a marker or reporter gene.

Ring monooxygenases:

DBT desulphurization:

-HCH dehydrochlorination:

Biosensor strains against explosives present in antipersonnel landmines

We employ our genetic platforms for evolving transcriptional regulators responsive to residues of explosives

Ongoing research projects

+DNT

Refactoring a minimal TOL plasmid.

de-construction and re-construction the TOL pathway and its regulatory elements encoded in the pWW0 plasmid of Pseudomonas putida mt-2.

Ongoing research projects

Bioremediation and biosensing of arsenic pollution.

Synthetic Biology approach for the design of bacterial strains capable of responding differently to the presence of low and high concentration of arsenic in the medium.

Orthogonalization of metabolic modules.

The Proteomic Switch: a new strategy to bring about conditional proteomic knockouts in E. coli

Ongoing research projectsLogic circuit analysis of the TOL circuit of P. putida

Predicting biodegradation

Learning machine

Gomez et al. Mol Sys Biol (2007)

C CO

HH

H

H

Acetaldehyde

Solubility: 0.1 g/100 mlMW: 44 D

Atomic triads:C-C-H 4C-C=O 1H-C-H 3H-C=O 1

AerialAnimal hostArtificialFreshwater sedimentFreshwaterFreshwaters-Saline watersGeothermalGutHydrothermalMarine hostOilOralOther tissuePlantsSaline sedimentSaline watersSoilSoil-Freshwaters interfaseSoil-Saline waters interfaseVagina

Environmental and taxonomic diversity

http://metagenomics.uv.es/envDB

EnvDB databaseFor the study of environmental and taxonomic diversity

GROUP LEADER

PROF. VÍCTOR DE LORENZO

POSTDOCTORAL

BELÉN CALLES

AITOR DE LAS HERAS

JOSE IGNACIO JIMÉNEZ

ESTEBAN MARTÍNEZ

JAVIER TAMAMES

PREDOCTORAL

ALEJANDRO ARCE

MAX CHAVARRÍA

RAFAEL SILVA-ROCHA

TECHNICIANS

SOFÍA FRAILE