Profile

Career

2002-	Professor of Biotechnology	Department of Biology, University of York
2001 - 2002	Reader in Biotechnology	University of Cambridge
1991 - 2002	Staff Fellow, Tutor and Director of Studies for Natural Sciences (Biological)	Trinity Hall, Cambridge
1990 - 2001	University Lecturer	Institute of Biotechnology, University of Cambridge
1988 - 1991	Research Fellow	Wolfson College, Cambridge
1987	PhD	University of Kent
1986 - 1990	Postdoctoral Research Associate	Institute of Biotechnology, University of Cambridge
1983	BSc Applied Biology	Hatfield Polytechnic

Research

Overview

The major research themes of our laboratory are microbial metabolism, biocatalysis and environmental biotechnology. A primary goal is to understand how microorganisms have adapted to utilise xenobiotic compounds as carbon and nitrogen sources for growth. The enzymes mediating these pathways often have potential commercial applications as recognition components in biosensors, as biocatalysts for synthetic chemistry, for the production of biofuels and for the bioremediation of soil and ground water. We are now engaged in extensive structural analysis of a number of these enzymes using X-ray crystallography. Work is also focusing on generating carefully designed mutant forms of a number of these enzymes to understand their catalytic mechanisms. A principal theme of our research is the biodegradation, biotransformation and phytoremediation of explosives.

Discoveries

We discovered a novel cytochrome P450 system termed XplA/B from Rhodococcus rhodochrous (11Y) that degrades the high explosive RDX. As a model system for RDX phytoremediation, Arabidopsis expressing XplA/B were grown in RDX contaminated soil and found to remove and degrade the explosive from the soil. Our work suggests that expressing XPlA/B in landscape plants may provide a suitable remediation strategy for explosive contaminated sites.

Current projects

• Sustainable range management of RDX and TNT by phytoremediation with engineered plants (Funding body: SERDP)
• The molecular biology of nitroamine degradation in soils (Funding body: SERDP)
• New tools for the realisation of cost-effective liquid biofuels from plant biomass (joint with Simon McQueen-Mason) (Funding body: BBSRC)
• Targeted analysis of microbial lignocellulolytic secretomes - a new approach to enzyme discovery. biomass (Funding body: Bilateral BBSRC-FAPESP)
• Exposing explosives: novel synthetic gene circuits for explosive detection via innovative waveguide sensing (Funding body: BBSRC)

Research group(s)

 

Status	Name	Project
Senior Research Associate	Liz Rylott	SERDP - Sustainable Range Management of RDX and TNT by Phytoremediation with Engineered Plants
Research Associate	Anna Szczepanska	BBSRC - Proteomic analysis of the microbial degradation of lignocellulose (joint with SMM group)
Research Associate	Anne Readshaw	Brunel University. Studying Effect of Dutasteride on plant growth and development using Arabidopsis
Research Associate	Joe Bennett	BBSRC - Synthetic biology biosensors
Research Associate	Katrin Besser	BBSRC - New tools for the realisation of cost-effective liquid biofuels from plant biomass (joint with SMM group)
Research Associate	Marcelo Kern	BBSRC - New tools for the realisation of cost-effective liquid biofuels from plant biomass (joint with SMM group)
Visiting Research Associate	Shaza Mohamad	Malaysian Government - Discovering novel lignocellulose degrading enzymes from ‘gribble’ for the production of liquid biofuels.  (joint with SMM group)
Research Technician	Mariya Budarina	SERDP - Sustainable Range Management of RDX and TNT by Phytoremediation with Engineered Plants
Senior Research Technician	Susannah Bird	BBSRC - Proteomic analysis of the microbial degradation of lignocellulose (joint with SMM group)
Senior Research Technician	Luisa Elias	BBSRC - New tools for the realisation of cost-effective liquid biofuels from plant biomass (joint with SMM group)
Research Student	Will Eborall	BBSRC - Discovering novel lignocellulose degrading enzymes from ‘gribble’ for the production of liquid biofuels.  (joint with SMM group)
Research Student	Dana Sabir	Ministry of Higher Education & Scientific Research, Kurdish Regional Government - Studies on evolution of xplA in RDX-degrading bacteria
Research Student	Emily Johnston	BBSRC -Elucidating the signalling mechanisms behind the specificity of plant response to xenobiotic stress
Research Student	Vanda Gunning	Role of glutathione transferases in detoxification of TNT
ESR/Research Student	Maria Razalan	EU Marie Curie ITN - Mining plant genomes for P450 biocatalysts
Research Student	Nicola Oates	BBSRC - Proteomic analysis of the microbial degradation of lignocellulose (joint with SMM group)
Research Student	Kyriakos  Tzafestas	Burgess Foundation - Phytoremediation of the explosive TNT
Research Administrator	Margaret Cafferky	PA to Neil Bruce & P4FIFTY project admin

Available PhD research projects

Mining composting communities for new lignocellulose mobilising enzymes

From both a fundamental and industrial biotech viewpoint understanding the deconstruction of lignocellulose in soil and compost is of central importance. In the natural environments microbial communities can efficiently degrade or modify lignin to enable the effective enzymatic hydrolysis of the polysaccharides present in plant cell walls. Globally, this is important for cycling carbon in the environment and as potential sources of biocatalysts for efforts at converting plant biomass into biofuels and commodity chemicals. The objectives of this project are to use metatranscriptomics and proteomics to determine gene- and protein-centred details to determine new mechanisms and improved methods of lignocellulose deconstruction in mixed microbial communities from composting cereal straw. The project will use proteomics analysis to interrogate the secretome of microbial communities in composting cereal straw and metatranscriptomics will be used to explore the expression of genes associated with lignocellulose digestion. To identify new linocellulose degrading enzymes, the peptide sequences from the proteomics analysis will be used to probe the metatranscriptomic library for full and partial coding sequences. These coding sequences will be cloned, expressed and the recombinant proteins characterised.

Publications

Selected publications

Florian, F., Martinez Fleites,M., Delenne, M., Baudendistel, N., Hauer, B., Turkenburg, J.P, Hart, S., Bruce, N.C. and Grogan, G. (2010) A Covalent Succinylcysteine-like Intermediate in the Enzyme-Catalyzed Transformation of Maleate to Fumarate by Maleate Isomerase. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 132: 11455-11457.

Beynon, E.R., Symons, Z.C., Jackson, R.G., Rylott, E.R. and Bruce, N.C. (2009). The role of oxophytodienoate reductases in the detoxification of the explosive 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene by Arabidopsis. Plant Physiol., 151: 253-261.

Jackson, R. G., Rylott, E.L., Fournier, D., Hawari, J. and Bruce, N. C. (2007) Exploring the biochemical properties and remediation applications of the unusual explosives degrading cytochrome P450 system XplA/B. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 104: 16822-16827.

External activities

Memberships

• Editorial Boards: Applied and Environmental Microbiology
• Member of the College of Reviewers for the Canada Research Chairs Program
• York Science Director of CoEBio3 (Centre of Excellence in Biocatalysis, Biotransformations and Biocatalytic Manufacture)
• Co-Founder and Director of Bioniqs Ltd