Join us for a discussion with Northwestern University Ph.D. Students Brett Palmero and Annie Gomez: “Prokaryotes have Organelles too: Ongoing Investigations to Engineer the Bacterial Microcompartment”. In line with the Honors Program’s “Emerging Scholars” Series, Brett and Annie will discuss both their research and their educational paths. The STEM Scholars Program and the Honors Program cosponsor this hybrid event.

Please register to attend this event. After registering, you'll receive a link to join in a confirmation email. 

Research Abstract:
One distinction made between eukaryotes and prokaryotes is that prokaryotes do not have cellular compartmentalization in the form of organelles. In actuality, many species of bacteria harbor organelles that aid in the spatial organization of various cellular processes. One such organelle is the bacterial microcompartment (MCP), which is a proteinaceous organelle that encapsulates a metabolic pathway inside of a porous shell made up of a diverse set of protein subunits. In this talk, two researchers will discuss their ongoing work to investigate and engineer the MCP.

Encapsulation of a metabolic pathway inside of a porous protein shell creates a diffusion barrier that can potentially sequester pathway intermediates and cofactors, making them private to the encapsulated pathway. Brett Palmero is investigating the possible benefits of pathway encapsulation on metabolism by encapsulating heterologous metabolic pathways and observing changes to pathway flux. His goal is to confer these benefits to metabolic pathways used in the bioproduction of commodity goods. 

MCPs can also be repurposed for the development of nanostructures that can facilitate the transportation/encapsulation of industrial compounds. Annie Gomez is investigating how mutations can affect protein assembly by mutating charged amino acids in two abundant MCP shell proteins and observing how these changes influence the MCP's assembly mechanisms.  Her goal is to determine the self-assembly properties of shell proteins and determine their governing factors to reprogram MCP assemblies with enhanced stability.