Protein Engineering and Molecular Enzymology

Protein engineering is a novel and dynamic field, which leads to production of modified proteins used to elucidate biological processes, structure-function relations of proteins, for the development of bioactive compounds and applications of proteins in all domains of biotechnologies. This class mainly aims to provide (i) the theoretical bases for the understanding and design of protein engineering approaches exploiting structural and functional information on the target proteins and (ii) the tools to carry out protein engineering and analyzing engineered proteins.
The course is ideally linked to those dealing with metabolic engineering, structural biology, bioinformatics, nanotechnologies and drug design.

At the end of this class , the students are expected to:
(1) have refreshed basic concepts in protein structure-function relations and enzyme catalysis;
(2) have acquired an advanced understanding of theoretical aspects of enzyme catalysis and of the experimental approaches used to correlate structure-function relations with an emphasis on the use of this knowledge to engineer novel enzyme forms in the context of fundamental science projects and biotechnological applications;
(3) have understood the rational of current protein engineering approaches and methods;
(4) have acquired the ability to correlate the theoretical and experimental connections among the disciplines involved and appreciate their relevance to biotechnological developments;
(5) have acquired the technical vocabulary needed to critically read research articles and to present them in oral and written forms.