Seminario Manuel Benedetti, University of L’Aquila, Italy: From a danger signal to the biosynthesis of novel phenolic compounds
Alessandra Del Giudice vi invita al seminario:
From a danger signal to the biosynthesis of novel phenolic compounds
di Manuel Benedetti, Università dell'Aquila, Italia
Il seminario avrà luogo martedì 4 febbraio alle 11.30 in Sala Parravano, ed. Cannizzaro (CU014).
Abstract
Plant cell wall is an extracellular matrix composed of polysaccharides, polyphenols and proteins. The enzymatic hydrolysis of cell wall polysaccharides results in the production of oligosaccharides with nature of damage-associated molecular patterns (DAMPs) that are perceived by plants as danger signals1. Oligosaccharide-oxidases (OSOXs), flavoenzymes belonging to the sub-family of “berberine bridge enzyme-like proteins”, oxidize these oligosaccharides by quenching their DAMP action and concomitantly converting molecular O2 into H2O2 2-4. Here we show a novel reaction mechanism through which the oxidizing activity on short oligosaccharides, instead of producing H2O2, led to the reduction of oxidized phenols (bi- phenoquinones), highlighting a possible application of OSOXs in synthetic biology5. By combining the oxidative-polymerizing activity of metalloenzymes on simple phenolics and the reducing activity of OSOXs on bi-phenoquinones, we succeeded at synthetizing a variety of novel oligo-phenols potentially exploitable in different industrial sectors.
Keywords: plant cell wall, DAMPs, oligosaccharide oxidase, bi-phenoquinone, oligo-phenols, synthetic biology.
1 Benedetti et al., 2015. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1504154112
2 Benedetti et al., 2018. doi: 10.1111/tpj.13852
3 Locci et al., 2019. doi: 10.1111/tpj.14237
4 Costantini et al., 2024. doi: 10.1093/plphys/kiad457
5 Giovannoni et al., 2025. doi: 10.1016/j.plaphy.2024.109466
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Dr. Manuel Benedetti |
Dr. Manuel Benedetti got a PhD in Botanical Sciences at Sapienza University of Rome in 2012 where he continued to work as post-Doc up to 2016. During this period, he worked in the field of plant immunity with a particular focus on the structural analysis of the protein complex formed by fungal polygalacturonase and its plant inhibitor, the in vivo isolation of cell wall damage-associated molecular patterns (DAMPs) and the identification of novel oligosaccharide oxidases of plant origin. From 2016 to 2019, he was employed as a post-Doc at the University of Verona where his research activity was focused on the use of transgenic microalgae for the degradation of lignocellulosic biomass. Since 2019, Dr. Benedetti is an assistant Professor in Plant Physiology at the University of L'Aquila where he is working on the characterization of novel cell wall-acting enzymes and the analysis of their physiological role by using biochemical and transgenic approaches.