UROP Project

Genetic engineering of probiotic E. coli Nissle strain

microbiology, biomedical engineering, synthetic biology

Research Mentor: Dongheon Lee,
Department, College, Affiliation: Chemical & Biomedical Engineering, FAMU-FSU College of Engineering
Contact Email: dl25s@fsu.edu
Research Assistant Supervisor (if different from mentor):
Research Assistant Supervisor Email:
Faculty Collaborators: Cesar Rodriguez
Faculty Collaborators Email: cesar.rodriguez@med.fsu.edu

Looking for Research Assistants: Yes
Number of Research Assistants: 2
Relevant Majors: open to all majors
Project Location: 2001 Levy Avenue
Research Assistant Transportation Required: There is a FSU shuttle to FAMU-FSU College of Engineering
Remote or In-person: In-person
Approximate Weekly Hours: 10, Flexible schedule (Combination of business and outside of business. TBD between student and research mentor.)
Roundtable Times and Zoom Link:

• Day: Wednesday, September 2
  Start Time: 4:00
  End Time: 4:30
  Zoom Link: https://fsu.zoom.us/j/7152536248?omn=93894965226
• Day: Thursday, September 3
  Start Time: 3:30
  End Time: 4:00
  Zoom Link: https://fsu.zoom.us/j/7152536248?omn=93894965226

Project Description

Escherichia coli (E. coli) is a working horse for modern molecular biology and synthetic biology research. While there are a wide variety of E. coli strains exist, E. coli Nissle 1917 (EcN) is a probiotic strain and has gained generally recognized as safe status from FDA due to its non pathogenicity and its potential as therapeutics for many diseases such as gut inflammation. Due to this feature, EcN has been extensively studied and engineered to detect onset of a disease or deliver therapeutic biomolecules at disease sites in our guts. Inspired by this, we want to engineer EcN as a potential therapeutic for various metabolic disorder. In order to achieve this goal, we need to genetically engineer genomes of EcN. Specifically, we need to insert genes of interest into EcN's genome so that EcN can stably express the genes. In other scenarios, we need to delete EcN's native genes. In this proposed UROP project, a student will learn various genetic engineering tools available for E. coli and apply them to EcN to seek a robust method for doing genetical engineering in EcN.

Research Tasks: Literature Review, Experimental Design, Microbial culture, Molecular cloning, Data Collection, Data Analysis, Scientific Writing, and Presentation

Skills that research assistant(s) may need: Recommended: Prior coding knowledge, Basic knowledge of molecular biology