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HEIndividual fellowship2022–2024

PlaBioC · FORMATION OF HIGH-VALUE DENSE PLANT BIOCONDENSATES

Horizon Europe — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Duration
2022-12-01 → 2024-11-30
EU contribution
€230,774
Participants
1
Scheme
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF

Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.

Results in brief

FORMATION OF HIGH-VALUE DENSE PLANT BIOCONDENSATES

To achieve a more sustainable future, we must transition from fossil fuel-based production systems to greener alternatives. Instead of relying on carbon-emitting processes, we need to embrace bioproduction, where carbon dioxide serves as the sole carbon source. In nature, photosynthetic organisms master this process. However, expanding this environmentally friendly system to synthesize high-value compounds that are either not produced or only available in low amounts in current photosynthetic systems presents a challenge. A critical aspect of bioproduction is the ability to store high-value natural products without causing toxicity to the host organism. By studying plants that naturally accumulate these compounds in high concentrations; we aim to transfer the knowledge to engineered bioproduction systems. The PlaBioC project focused on two model plants known for their ability to store natural products in high amounts: Vanilla planifolia, which accumulates vanillin glucoside at a concentration of 2.2 kg/L in the inner part of maturing pods and Sorghum bicolor, which produces the defence compound dhurrin, reaching up to 30% of dry mass in the upper tissues of seedlings. The primary goal was to determine whether these plants store these compounds in dense biocondensates and to identify key factors involved in their formation.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union

Project objective

We need to turn our production systems upside down! Instead of using fossil fuels and release carbon dioxide, we need to shift to biobased production with carbon dioxide as the sole carbon source. In nature, this is already done at a scale feeding the worlds human population. The process used in nature is photosynthesis. This environmentally benign production system needs to be expanded to include the synthesis of high-value compounds that are not currently produced in photosynthetic systems or produced in low amounts. When produced in high amounts, these different types of high-value natural products need to be stored without being auto-toxic to the production host. This is where storage in dense biocondensates becomes a key success parameter. Biocondensate formation in plants is a black box, but proposed mechanisms point to phase partitioning induced by proteins with intrinsically disordered domains or by NAtural Deep Eutectic Solvents (NADES). NADES are compounds like sugars, amino acids, organic acids, and choline that when mixed in specific stoichiometric ratios have a lower melting point than the individual components. Certain plants manage to accumulate natural products in very high amounts without autotoxicity or cell homeostasis problems. This is the case in my two proposed experimental systems: Vanilla planifolia, which accumulates vanillin glucoside at 2.2kg/L levels in the plastids of the maturing pods; and Sorghum bicolor that produce the defence compound dhurrin, in amounts reaching 30% of the dry mass in etiolated seedlings. In order to identify the players involved in biocondensate formation, I will combine methods of cellular and organelle isolation with imaging and state-of-the-art analytic chemistry, metabolomics, and transcriptomics. Studying how plants orchestrate the formation of dense biocondensates to store high-value compounds in high amounts would be key to make green bio-production systems feasible.

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

  • KOBENHAVNS UNIVERSITET · KOBENHAVNCoordinatorDenmark

Links

Data: CORDIS, © European Union