Brett Boghigian

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File:Brett.jpg

That's me.

Lab Work

General Information

I am currently working on enhancing and optimizing the biosynthesis of 6-deoxyerythronolide B (6-dEB), precursor to the potent antibiotic erythromycin, through Escherichia coli, the workhorse of the bacterial world. This work combines principles of molecular biology and biochemical process engineering. I am working with a new New Brunswick BioFlo 110 Bioreactor for large-scale production of 6-dEB and a new Agilent 1100 Series HPLC (high performance liquid chromatograph) equipped with an Alltech 800 Series ELSD (evaporative light scattering detector) for analysis. I am also developing a new high-throughput method for analyzing our bacterial system using my studies in the field of proteomics (global protein production within a given cell or tissue). In collaboration with Dr. Mary Lopez and Dr. Wayne Patton at PerkinElmer Life & Analytical Sciences, we will use various proteomic techniques and instruments (2D SDS-PAGE, fluorescent protein staining and imaging, MALDI O-TOF mass spectrometry, and others) to examine the proteome various engineered strains versus our parent strain of E. coli. Using quantitative proteomic data, we can identify which proteins are down- or up-regulated during certain intracellular conditions (ie. insertion of new plasmid DNA) or extracellular conditions (ie. altered bioprocess conditions), which can be exploited for further enhanced natural product biosynthesis. I am also responsible for website maintenance and our lab’s (frequent) computer problems.

Current Projects

• Examining the effect of the introduction of the gene coding for S-adenosylmethionine synthetase (SAMs) in engineered Escherichia coli on 6-deoxyerythronolide B biosynthesis.
• Proteomics aiding in natural product biosynthesis -- an application to Escherichia coli for enhancing 6-deoxyerythronolide B biosynthesis.
• Inverse metabolic engineering approach for enhancing biosynthesis of 6-deoxyerythronolide B in engineered Escherichia coli.

Publications

Peer-Reviewed Publications:
* Scrivener E, Boghigian BA, Golenko E, Bogdanova A, Jackson P, Mikulskis A, Denoyer E, Courtney P, Lopez MF, Patton WF. Performance validation of an improved Xenon-arc lamp-based CCD camera system for multispectral imaging in proteomics. Proteomics. 2005 Nov;5(17):4354-66. (PubMed) (Times Cited: 1)

Abstracts:
* Stehmann C, Boghigian BA, Golenko E, Scrivener E, Patton WF, Lopez MF. A Xenon-arc lamp-based charge-coupled device (CCD) camera system for multispectral imaging in proteomics. Mol Cell Proteomics. (Abstract from HUPO (Human Proteome Organization) 3rd Annual World Congress) (Poster)

Academic & Research Interests

My academic and research interests lie in integrating molecular biology and biochemistry with engineering techniques for a broad-range of clinical applications. Specific interests and current projects:

• Natural product biosynthesis: Metabolic and process engineering of Escherichia coli for biosynthesis of medicinal natural products.
• Metabolic engineering: High-throughput proteomics and "omics" technologies aiding in the fields of metabolic and cellular engineering.
• Systems biology: The development of high-throughput tools and methodologies for examining systems from the systems to the metabolic to the molecular level.
• Philosophy of science: Biomolecular evolution, biological reductionism, philosophy of molecular biology, bioethics

Personal

I am an undergraduate pursuing a bachelor's of science in chemical engineering with a second major of biomedical engineering. I am also minoring in philosophy. If not evident from my native accent, I grew up in a suburb of Boston: Bedford, MA and attended Bedford High School. I enjoy hanging out with my friends, watching movies (The Godfather and Scarface, in particular), watching the Patriots and Red Sox, listening to music, and (given time) playing sports (tennis, golf, ping-pong, running, baseball, and basketball).

Links

About Me

• Article/Picture in the Tufts Daily (3/13/06) - 2006 Undergraduate Research Symposium
• On the CHBE Department website
• On the School of Engineering Website

Departmental Websites

• Tufts University
• Tufts University - The Pfeifer Lab
• Tufts University - School of Engineering
• Tufts University - Department of Chemical & Biological Engineering
• Tufts University - Department of Biomedical Engineering
• Tufts University - Department of Chemistry
• Tufts University - Department of Philosophy
• Massachusetts Institute of Technology - Department of Chemical Engineering
• Massachusetts Institute of Technology - Biological Engineering Division
• Massachusetts Institute of Technology - Department of Biology
• Harvard University - Department of Chemistry & Chemical Biology
• Harvard University - Division of Engineering & Applied Sciences (Bioengineering)
• Cornell University - School of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
• Stanford University - Department of Chemical Engineering
• University of California at Berkeley - Department of Chemical Engineering
• California Institute of Technology - Department of Chemical Engineering
• The Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research
• The Broad Institute
• The Howard Hughes Medical Institute

Labs of Interest

• Gregory Stephanopoulos (MIT)
• K. Dane Wittrup (MIT)
• Daniel I.C. Wang (MIT)
• Kyongum Lee (Tufts)
• Doug Lauffenburger (MIT)
• Drew Endy (MIT)
• Bruce Tidor (MIT)
• Eric Alm (MIT)
• Kelvin Lee (Cornell)
• Jay Kesling (UC Berkeley)
• Chaitan Khosla (Stanford)
• Christina Smolke (CalTech)
• Frances Arnold (CalTech)
• David Cane (Brown)
• George Whitesides (Harvard)
• Gavin MacBeath (Harvard)
• David Edwards (Harvard)
• George Church (Harvard)
• Christopher Walsh (Harvard)

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