Yujie Men

Assistant Professor, Chemical and Environmental Engineering
University of Minnesota

Multi-Omics Investigation of Carbon Flux Networks in Environmental Bacteria of Biotechnological Relevance

Carbon-fluorine (C–F) bond is the strongest single bond in nature. Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) are a large group of man-made chemicals with broad applications causing severe environmental concerns due to their persistence and toxicity.

Although microbial defluorination of naturally occurring and less fluorinated compounds, such as monofluoroacetate, has been well studied, biodefluorination pathways and mechanisms of highly fluorinated PFAS have not been clearly understood.

An introduction of the current research status of microbial defluorination will be
given first, followed by the most recent findings on microbial defluorination of a variety of per- and polyfluorinated compounds, defluorination pathway elucidation, and the identification of responsible microorganisms.

THURSDAY  I  OCT. 13 I  3:30-4:30 PM CST  I  HYBRID SEMINAR

Adamala Lab

Assistant Professor, Genetics, Cell Biology, and Development
University of Minnesota

Life but not alive: bioengineering with synthetic cells

All of biological research is done on a single sample: that of modern, terrestrial life. In the quest to engineer synthetic living systems, we seek to expand that sample size, enabling investigation to general properties of life in the lineage agnostic, synthetic organisms.

Synthetic minimal cells are liposomal bioreactors that have some, but not all properties of live cells. Creating artificial living systems allows us to diversify the chassis of biological studies, and provides new opportunities for bioengineering.

We can answer questions about healthy and diseased natural cells, and ask new questions about the limits and possibilities of biology.

THURSDAY  I  OCT. 6 I  3:30-4:30 PM CST  I  HYBRID SEMINAR