The research in my lab focuses on developing enzymatic and microbial approaches for the production of pharmaceutically important compounds as well as fuels and renewable chemicals. The research themes include the identification and characterization of enzymes, protein engineering for improved or novel enzymes, combinatorial biosynthesis, and yield optimization with engineered cellular regulation. The research projects are interdisciplinary in nature, involving the principles and techniques of Biochemistry, Microbiology, Molecular Biology, Protein Engineering, Metabolic Engineering, and Synthetic Biology. The far-reaching objective is to achieve sustainable production of liquid biofuels, bulk chemicals, and high-value chemicals through microbial synthesis. These will provide effective solutions to the problems that our petroleum-based industry is facing, significantly impacting the disciplines of chemistry, biological sciences and engineering. Below are the selected specific research areas currently underway in my lab:
Area 1: Engineered biosynthesis of coumarin for drug discovery
Area 2: Engineering microbial synthesis of 5-hydroxytrytophan for nutraceutical and pharmaceutical applicationsÂ
Area 3: Expanding metabolism for the generation of value-added aromatic compounds
Area 4: Investigating and establishing novel carbon utilization mechanisms for microbial synthesis
Area 5: Engineering dynamic control network to enhance microbial synthesis of natural products