Biotechnology for Lignocellulosic Biomass

Evaluation of the potential of ligninolytic fungi in plastic polymers transformation

Description: The student will focus on evaluating the potential capabilities of ligninolytic fungi to transform plastic polymers and identify the oxidative enzymatic activities involved in the process. For this purpose, different species of ligninolytic fungi (whose genomes have been sequenced) characterized by a great diversity of life styles and differences in the composition of their ligninolytic machinery will be selected. The student will contribute to develop the appropriate methodology to cultivate fungi in the presence of a large variety of plastic polymers. In those cases where biotransformation of these compounds are observed, he/she will carry out secretomic analyses in order to identify the enzymes potentially involved. Depending on the results obtained, he/she will characterize some of the enzymes identified after their heterologous expression in Escherichia coli or Saccharomyces cerevisiae in order to corroborate their capacity to act on the tested plastic polymers.