Biochemical and functional studies of cellobiohydrolases from basidiomycetes of white-rot fungi with biotechnological potential

• Grant number: 19/06663-8
• Support type: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Effective date (Start): August 01, 2019
• Effective date (End): June 30, 2023
• Field of knowledge: Biological Sciences - Biochemistry - Chemistry of Macromolecules
• Principal researcher: Fernando Segato
• Grantee: Bianca Oliva
• Home Institution: Escola de Engenharia de Lorena (EEL). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Lorena , SP, Brazil

Abstract

The use of lignocellulosic biomass as a renewable source for the production of biofuels is essential for the near future due to the depletion of oil reserves and the inconvenience of carbon emission by this fossil source. However, the pretreatment and enzymatic conversion processes required for the conversion of polysaccharides from biomass to monosaccharides still require scientific and technological development in order to make industrial production feasible, mainly due to the restrictions on enzymatic hydrolysis caused by the presence of residual lignin in the pretreated biomass. The adsorption of enzymes in lignin is an important factor for the low efficiency and wastage of enzymes in the enzymatic conversion step. In this stage, commercial cocktails are mostly composed of cellobiohydrolases (CBHs), however CBHs are produced only from ascomycetes, which do not act efficiently on lignified substrates. White-rot basidiomycetes act efficiently on lignified substrates, but have few studies on their CBHs and almost no practical approach has been performed on enzymatic cocktails. Some structural factors of the CBHs have already been pointed out by promoting a greater unproductive adsorption of these enzymes in the lignin. Combining the evolutionary advantage of basidiomycetes and the study of their enzymes, the present project becomes an interesting strategy to overcome the difficulties that lignin imposes on enzymatic activities, the search for CBHs with weak affinity for lignin and the engineering of this class of enzymes. Therefore, this project proposes the cloning, expression, characterization and analysis of lignin adsorption of all the cellobiohydrolases GH6 and GH7 of the basidiomycete Phanerochaete chrysosporium and genetic mutation aiming the development of CBHs for lower adsorption in lignin. (AU)

Scientific publications

(References retrieved automatically from Web of Science and SciELO through information on FAPESP grants and their corresponding numbers as mentioned in the publications by the authors)

VELASCO, JOSMAN; OLIVA, BIANCA; GONCALVES, ALINE LARISSA; LIMA, AWANA SILVA; FERREIRA, GISLENE; FRANCA, BRUNO ALVES; MULINARI, EVANDRO JOSE; GONCALVES, THIAGO AUGUSTO; SQUINA, FABIO MARCIO; SEIKI KADOWAKI, MARCO ANTONIO; MAIORANO, ALFREDO; POLIKARPOV, IGOR; DE OLIVEIRA, LEANDRO CRISTANTE; SEGATO, FERNANDO. Functional characterization of a novel thermophilic exo-arabinanase fromThermothielavioides terrestris. Applied Microbiology and Biotechnology, v. 104, n. 19 AUG 2020. Web of Science Citations: 0.