PIX2025 - Sociology of Oil body cells in Chemical Interactions for Optimized pharmaceutical discovery (SOCIOPHARM) - (PREX2023-000053)

The general objective of the project is to characterize the metabolic sociology of plant cells and identify a new arsenal of bioactive metabolites of pharmacological interest by the combination of three complementary objectives: 1) Identification of new enzymatic variants and metabolites from new plant sources; 2). Dissection of the inter-organellar and inter-cellular chemical trafficking that shapes the metabolic 'sociology' of plant cells. 3) Identification of novel pharmacologically interesting bioactivities (anti-viral, anti-microbial, anti-cancer, anti-alzheimer…). The PhD Candidate’s selection will be based on their experience in Plant Molecular Biology/Plant Genetics, Bioinformatics, plant genotyping, DNA and RNA extraction from plants, RT-qPCR, CRISPR-Cas9, plasmid construction, plant transformation, post-translational modifications, protoplasts preparation, protein extraction and purification, Western Blot.