"The Antoniewicz lab for Metabolic Engineering and Systems Biology is focused on developing next generation tools for engineering microbial and mammalian cells applied to specific problems in biotechnology and medicine. Our current areas of focus include: 1) production of biofuels using microbes such as E. coli, yeast, and thermophiles; 2) the study and manipulation of mammalian cell phenotypes in diabetes.
Our research includes all modern technologies and techniques for molecular biology, metabolic flux analysis, cell biology, mass spectrometry, genomics, computer simulation and bioinformatics. The primary goal of our research is to provide a fundamental understanding of the function and regulation of complex biological processes that emerge through the interaction of genes, proteins, and metabolites at multiple metabolic and genetic regulatory levels. To achieve this, we develop novel experimental and computational tools to quantify cellular physiology and apply genome-wide models of cellular interactions to interpret the large sets of biological data generated from these technologies.
Our interests range from looking at model microbial systems, i.e. Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Escherichia coli and thermophiles, to investigations of mammalian cells such as hepatocytes, adipocytes and myocytes. Beyond large-scale identification of interactions and transcriptional control of network operations in isolated cells, we develop technologies for studying disease phenotypes at the whole organism level. Our results find applications in many areas including industrial biotechnology, e.g. metabolic engineering of microbial cells for the production of biofuels and biochemicals, and medicine, in particular, in the area of human (metabolic) disorders such as type-2 diabetes and cancer."
Selected PublicationsSelected Awards
