Christine Salomon

Christine Salomon

CHRISTINE SALOMON

Associate Professor
Center for Drug Design

PhD, Scripps Institution of Oceanography UCSD, 2001

csalomon@umn.edu
drugdesign.umn.edu/bio/cdd-faculty-staff/christine-salomon

Research Interests

Biological control of plant disease. Antibiotic resistance developed by biocontrol organisms. Elucidation and modulation of communication networks among bacterial populations.

Bio

The overarching goal of Christine Salomon’s research is to discover novel natural products with useful biological activities. Additional areas of interest for the Salomon lab include biocontrol of agricultural pathogens and the elucidation and modulation of communication networks among bacterial populations using natural products.

Cara Santelli

Cara Santelli

CARA SANTELLI

Associate Professor
Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences

PhD, Joint Program in Oceanography, Massachusetts Institute of Technology/Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, 2007

santelli@umn.edu
esci.umn.edu/people/Cara-Santelli
umngeomicrobes.wordpress.com

Research Interests

Impact of microbial activity on geological and environmental processes such as mineral formation, mineral alteration and weathering, metal and metalloid redox transformations, nutrient biogeochemical cycling, and the remediation of polluted environments. Objectives are driven by fundamental scientific research on environmentally relevant biogeochemical processes and key elements in nature influenced by anthropogenic activities such as mining and agriculture.

Bio

Cara Santelli’s research examines the impact of microbial activity on geological and environmental processes such as mineral formation, mineral alteration and weathering, metal and metalloid redox transformations, nutrient biogeochemical cycling, and the remediation of polluted environments. The research objectives of the Santelli lab are driven by conducting fundamental scientific research on environmentally relevant biogeochemical processes and key elements in nature that are further influenced by anthropogenic activities, such as mining and agriculture. In addition to answering key questions on the mechanisms, metabolic pathways, and geochemical impact of mineral-microbe interactions, their work seeks to inform and improve strategies for remediating inorganic pollutants to improve the quality and health of water and soil environments.

Claudia Schmidt-Dannert

Claudia Schmidt-Dannert

CLAUDIA SCHMIDT-DANNERT

Professor
Department of Biochemistry, Molecular Biology, and Biophysics
Director, BioTechnology Institute

PhD, Biochemistry and Biotechnology, Technical University of Braunschweig, 1994

schmi232@umn.edu
cbs.umn.edu/schmidt-dannert-lab/home

Research Interests

Exploring and utilizing biosynthetic machineries to enable sustainable synthesis of valuable compounds for use as fine chemicals, pharmaceuticals, and chemical building blocks. Developing systems to carry out multi-enzyme biocatalysis in vitro and in recombinant hosts for the synthesis of chemicals. Design and fabrication of genetically programmable, self-organizing protein-based functional materials.

Bio

Claudia Schmidt-Dannert is interested in exploring and utilizing biosynthetic machineries to enable the discovery sustainable synthesis of valuable compounds for use as fine chemicals, pharmaceuticals and chemical building blocks. Her lab is developing and studying systems to carry out multi-enzyme biocatalysis in vitro and in recombinant hosts for the synthesis of chemicals. By mixing and matching enzymes with desired catalytic activities identified from different sources, the Schmidt-Dannert lab is designing cascades of enzymatic reactions for the synthesis of compounds of interest.

Janet Schottel

Janet Schottel

JANET SCHOTTEL

Professor
Biochemistry, Molecular Biology, and Biophysics

schot002@umn.edu
https://cbs.umn.edu/contacts/janet-l-schottel

 

Research Interests

mRNA stability, Plant-pathogen interactions, Gene expression

 

Research statement

One of my primary research interests focuses on the regulation of gene expression in cells in response to stresses such as desiccation, nutrient deprivation, culture density, osmotic stress, heat shock, and mechanical stress. Our approaches include studying the regulation of transcription, mRNA degradation and protein synthesis in cells grown under a variety of culture conditions.

 
A new interest in the lab is the development of microbial-based therapies for cancer. An attenuated strain of Salmonella enterica Typhimurium is currently used in these studies. This organism is a gram-negative facultative bacterium that can invade and divide with macrophages and other cell types and thrives in hypoxic areas of tumors. Previous reports have indicated that administration of this organism significantly reduced tumor size and number in mouse models of metastatic osteosarcoma, primary neuroblastoma and liver adenocarcinoma. Current work is focused on optimizing the cancer suppressing activity of this bacterium by expressing various cytokine genes and determining the most effective protocol for administration of this organism to the mice with potential future applications to humans.

 

Burckhard Seelig

Burckhard Seelig

BURCKHARD SEELIG

Professor
Department of Biochemistry, Molecular Biology, and Biophysics

PhD, Biochemistry, Freie Universitat Berlin

seelig@umn.edu
cbs.umn.edu/seelig-lab/home

Research Interests

Darwinian molecular evolution to generate novel proteins for synthetic biology and biomedical applications, study the origin and evolution of functional proteins, and investigate the history of the genetic code. Applied methods of in vitro and in vivo selection and evolution to generate de novo proteins with custom-made properties.

Bio

Burckhard Seelig’s research group implements Darwinian molecular evolution in a test tube to: (1) generate novel proteins for synthetic biology and biomedical applications; (2) study the origin and evolution of functional proteins; and (3) investigate the history of the genetic code. In his work, Burckhard applies methods of in vitro and in vivo selection and evolution to generate de novo proteins with custom-made properties. His lab also tailors existing enzymes to a variety of useful applications and established a general method to design novel enzymes from scratch.

W. Thomas Shier

W. Thomas Shier

W. THOMAS SHIER

Professor
Department of Medicine

shier001@umn.edu
612-624-9465

https://med.umn.edu/bio/pharmacy-faculty-by-department/w-shier


Research Interests
Antibiotics, Mycotoxins, Genome Mining, Extremophiles

The major focus of research of Dr. Shier’s laboratory is on developing new antibiotic drug discovery and production platforms. The research is focused on the following three approaches:
(1) Fungi that infect plants from the soil enter roots by releasing mycotoxins that target dividing cells in meristematic tissue. These mycotoxins are being investigated as a potential source of anticancer antibiotics.

(2) Genome mining as an approach to producing relatively large amounts of potential drugs from coral reef organisms and other sources by transferring biosynthesis gene packages to a Streptomyces species that grows well in culture and produces antibiotic well under industrial fermentation conditions.

(3) A strategy for finding novel antibiotics in screening programs has been to examine extremophiles of various types. We are exploring toxic waste dumps as a novel application of this strategy.