Team:UCLouvain

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The Gatekeeper

PROTEIN SECRETION AS SIMPLE AS OPENING A DOOR

The Gatekeeper project could offer a tremendous new tool for recombinant protein secretion in E. coli.

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Description

The Gatekeeper aims to implement a doorway in E. coli’s external membrane that could be opened and closed on demand ! Such universal “transform&go” type of secretion tool would represent a tremendous improvement for recombinant protein production or other biotechnological applications as secretion in E. coli remains a challenging problem.

Our plan was simple : we wanted to use mutagenesis tools and a strong selection design to build a door from an existing f1 bacteriophage porin. We were inspired by this filamentous bacteriophage virions escape strategy which are able to escape E. coli’s grasp through the porin without ever injuring their host.

Can the Gatekeeper revolutionize biopharmaceutical and industrial enzymes production ?

If you want to know a little bit more about the team, check out this awesome video.