Uncharted Biosynthetic Landscapes
Research
Our team is interested in discovering novel bioactive microbial metabolites. Microbial metabolites play important roles in medicine and they are a key source of antibiotics, anticancer agents or immunosuppressants. We develop sequencing, bioinformatics and synthetic biology methods to rapidly detect and characterize novel genes responsible for the biosynthesis of cryptic microbial metabolites.
We also work on involving the general public in helping to source new medicines through citizen science projects.
Some ongoing projects:
-Biosynthetic repertoire fingerprinting (Actinomap)
We develop Next Generation Sequencing strategies to rapidly evaluate the biosynthetic repertoire of thousands of microbial strains (>6000 actinobacteria lab collection)
-Scalable heterologous expression of Biosynthetic Gene Clusters (BGCs)
We leverage a uniquely large collection of >1000 cloned BGCs that can be mobilized and heterologously expressed in various superhost strains to discover novel bioactive natural products
-Host strain engineering
We genetically modify host strains to increase expression of heterologous BGCs and facilitate the study of their products
-Enable scalable heterologous expression strategies in novel taxa
We adapt our multiplexed cloning strategy to filamentous fungi, cyanobacteria and other taxa with rich underexplored biosynthetic potential
News
Citizen science
As part of our participatory initiative focused on exploring the potential of soil as a source of novel biosynthetic genes, citizens from across France have generously submitted over 1,500 soil samples.
You can check the first results of the analysis of their biosynthetic genes here:
https://www.sciencealapelle.fr/results
ERC Starting Grant
The European Research Council is now backing our lab ! We are hiring bright minds at all levels to supercharge our natural products discovery approach. Join us in a beautiful space in the heart of Paris and leverage our massive BGC cloning platform to discover new antibiotics and more !
Join the lab now!
Join us in a beautiful space in the heart of Paris and leverage our massive BGC cloning platform designed to discover new antibiotics and active molecules ! We clone BGCs hundreds at a time, express them in model hosts and send them all straight to mass spec and bioassays. Vast uncharted biosynthetic landscapes in front of us…
People
Vincent Libis
PI
PharmD., PhD. University Paris Cité, Postdoctoral training Rockefeller University
Filipe Marques
Postdoc
PhD. University of Porto / Saarland University
Baptiste Faussurier
PhD Student
M.Sc. Biotechnology, AgroParistech
Hien Le
Postdoc
PharmD., PhD.
Thijs Mattheus Peter Bal
Senior Engineer
PhD. Nord University
Tom Lorthios
PhD Student
M.Sc. Biotechnology, AgroParistech
Pablo Tris
PhD Student (Collaboration with Prof. Mehdi Beniddir - U. Paris Saclay)
M.Sc. Biology, École Pratique des Hautes Études, Paris Sciences et Lettres University
Chloé Lamoureux
Engineer
M.Sc. Biotechnology, Bordeaux University
Bismarck Olympio
Engineer
M.Sc. Biotechnology, Paris Saclay University
Evita Dollon
PhD Student
M.Sc. Biotechnology, AgroParisTech
Diana Rafaela Reis de Sousa
Visiting PhD Student (Leão lab, CIIMAR)
M.Sc. Applications in Biotechnology and Synthetic Biology, University of Porto
Alumni:
Ana Mihai
Senior Engineer
M.Phil. Biotechnology, University of Cambridge
Current position : PhD student, University of Zurich
Highlighted work
Libis V. et al. Multiplexed mobilization and expression of biosynthetic gene clusters.
Nature Communications, 13, 5256 (2022) doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-32858-0
Libis V. et al. Uncovering the biosynthetic potential of rare metagenomic DNA using co-occurrence network analysis of targeted sequences
Nature Communications, 10, 3848 (2019) doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-11658-z
All: https://scholar.google.fr/citations?user=jupnKncAAAAJ&hl=fr