Beyond the PhD - Continue as postdoc at PLEN
After achieving his PhD from the Microbial Biotechnology group in Section for Genetics and Microbiology at PLEN, Jan Kjølhede Vester continues as a postdoc working on a new project in the same group. The group is led by Associate Professor Peter Stougaard.
- My PhD project had the aim of identifying enzymes from an extreme environment, which could be used in industrial applications. The extreme environment was the cold and alkaline ikaite columns of SW Greenland, which harbor a microbial community adapted to the cold and alkaline conditions, and therefore also possess enzymes with these properties. Generally speaking, less than 1% of the bacteria from an environmental sample can be cultivated in the laboratory. During my PhD studies, my task has been to identify enzymes from the uncultured bacteria.
Jan Kjølhede Vester chose to access the uncultured bacteria by extracting total DNA and using this to establish an expression library in E. coli, which was screened for various enzyme activities.
- The most promising findings were two novel cold-active enzymes, a β-galactosidase capable of hydrolyzing lactose at fridge temperature, and an α-amylase with a remarkably low temperature optimum. The β-galactosidase could possibly be used in the dairy industry, and a possible application for the α-amylase is the detergent industry. A patent application has been filed for the α-amylase.
Jan Kjølhede Vester enjoyed his time as a PhD-student at PLEN, and therefore he was happy to be given the possibility to continue as a postdoc in the same group. He is now discovering enzymes for targeted hydrolysis of algal cell walls.
For more information
Contact: Jan Kjølhede Vester, Section for Genetics and Microbiology.
Read: Discovery of novel enzymes with industrial potential from a cold and alkaline environment by a combination of functional metagenomics and culturing by Jan Kjølhede Vester, Mikkel Andreas Glaring and Peter Stougaard in Microbial Cell Factories 2014, 13:72