IBIP seminar

Thursday, May 28, 2015

The utilization of plant promiscuous peptides as biotechnological tools

Pr Octavio L. Franco
Universidade Catolica de Brasilia, Pos-Graduação em Ciências Genômicas e Biotecnologia Coordinator of Centro de Análises Proteômicas e Bioquímicas – ocfranco@gmail.com

The phenomenon of protein promiscuity, in which multiple functions are associated with a single peptide structure, has gained attention in several research fields, including the plant defense. With this in mind, this talk intends to link various plant defense peptides with common scaffolds (defensins, cyclotides and 2S albumins), and multiple activities with the processes of promiscuity generation and protein evolvability. This link seems to create an efficient system of plant defense against insect pests and pathogens, and is thus essential to plant survival and evolution. Moreover I will also shed some light over future possibilities for the use of plant peptide promiscuity in designing novel drugs and synthetic biotechnological products..


Contact : Françoise Gosti

Contacts IBIP :
Sabine Zimmermann
Alexandre Martiniere
Christine Granier
Chantal Baracco