MSc defence: Annette Petersen

Name of MSc candidate

Annette Petersen

Title of thesis

Genetic Engineering of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii - Glucosinolate production in green microalgae

Summary

Glucosinolates are plant secondary metabolites that are of special interest due to their anti-cancerous effects in humans. The glucosinolate glucoraphanin has been of particular interest, but so far engineering of the biosynthesis pathway into a microbial host has been problematic. In the native host glucoraphanin is produced through two separate pathways; chain elongation of methionine in the chloroplast followed by core stucture formation in the cytosol.

The green microalga, Chlamydomonas reinhardtii could hold potential of being the organism of choice when engineering complex plant biosynthesis pathways. In this Master thesis, chain elongation pathway enzymes MAM, IPMI and IPMDH were engineerined into the plastid genome of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. Additionally, a set of pathway expression plasmids were constructed and the core structure pathway was attempted engineered into the nuclear genome by use of these. By engineering these two pathways into Chlamydomonas reinhardtii the alga's potential of expressing multigene exogenous pathways were assessed. The results serve as an important proof of concept of future metabolic engineering in this host.

External examiner

Morten Nørholm, Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Biosustainability

Supervisor

Hussam Nour-Eldin, DynaMo Center, University of Copenhagen