Marine Metagenomics for New Biotechnological Applications
The three major objectives of this project will be;
(1) to build up a consortium encompassing:
(i) the state-of-the-art facilities and expertise to sample unique and hardly accessible marine environments,
(ii) advanced technology for construction of metagenomic libraries,
(iii) modern sequencing, sequence annotation and the cutting-edge bioinformatics resources,
(iv) high-end activity screening technology,
(v) high-quality protein crystallization and structural analysis facilities and
(vi) companies with solid market positions in biocatalysis, drug discovery and cosmetics production.
The pump-priming of this consortium will;
(2) deliver a series of new biocatalytic processes, new lead products with anti-tumor activities and new solutes and antioxidant compounds within the project timeframe.
Finally,
(3) the new mechanisms of the functioning of extreme marine microbial consortia, their contribution to the global element cycling and possible impact of their activities on the global climate patterns, and, not least, the genomic basis of niche specificities that allow microbes to thrive in the extreme marine environments, will be revealed.