Sébastien NOUAILLE

My researches focus on understanding the reprogramming of gene expression in the bacterium Escherichia coli. Messenger RNAs are at the crossroads of transcriptional and post-transcriptional processes. Their concentrations are finely regulated by the bacterium to best adjust its metabolic capacities to the resources available in its environment. In the adaptation phase, the bacterium very quickly reshapes its transcriptome, particularly by controlling the stabilization or destabilization of mRNAs. We are looking for the molecular and cellular determinants that control mRNA stability. We are more particularly developing approaches at the molecular level centered on the weight of the 5’UTR sequences in this control (UTR shuffling, exhaustive library, etc.). The knowledge is then transposed to the creation of new tools for expressing proteins of biotechnological interest. A second part of research focuses on the incorporation of non-canonical amino acids into proteins of biotechnological interest to create new enzymatic capacities or properties. We study and optimize the expression of the orthogonal genes involved in non-canonical amino-acids incorporation as well as their repercussions on the transcriptome and the physiology of the bacterium.