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Module Objectives: To introduce students great potential of fungal and bacterial secondary metabolites and control of their production by genetic as well as epigenetic factors.
Module Content: Fungal and bacterial secondary metabolites have great potential due to their potent physiological influences on cellular functions such as antibiotics, antivirals, antifungals, antiapoptotics, cytotoxics, immunosuppressives, and deadly mycotoxins. Therefore, they are extremely important for medical, biotechnological and chemical applications. The focus of this advanced module is the fungal and bacterial secondary metabolites and the control of their production by genetic and epigenetic factors. Specific sections found in this module will be connected with chemical biology, genetics, epigenetics and fungal molecular biology. The major classes of microbial natural products and their biosynthetic pathways will be introduced. Potential impact of the bioactive metabolites in biotechnology, medicine and chemical biology will be discussed in depth. The term “gene clusters” will be introduced by analogy to prokaryotic operons. Control of gene clusters in fungi at the chromatin and epigenetic level will be examined by examples of histone modifications. Cellular signaling elements (MAPK, PKA, PKC) regulating the biosynthesis of fungal secondary metabolites will be analyzed.
This module is capped at 75 students.
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