Project Title: New botulinum molecules for biomedical applications

Project supervisor: Professor Bazbek Davletov (BMS and CMIAD)

Application deadline: Friday 14 December 2012.

Regulated secretion of neurotransmitters and hormones controls every aspect of the human body. Transmitters are stored in secretory vesicles which must fuse with the cell plasma membrane for release to occur. Botulinum neurotoxins bind with exquisite specificity neurons and neuromuscular junctions and then proteolyze proteins responsible for vesicle fusion, thereby causing blockade of neurotransmitter release and eventually muscle paralysis. We invented a technique to make new safer botulinum molecules which do not target neuromuscular junctions but instead can bind and silence central neurons and potentially endocrine cells.

This project aims to investigate the potential of new botulinum molecules in imaging and controlling various neuronal and endocrine functions. This study should provide novel insights into the working of the secretory machinery in both health and disease, and potentially will lead to novel therapeutic approaches.

References:

1. Reuters: Scientists find way to refine Botox for new uses
2. Darios F, Niranjan D, Ferrari E, Zhang F, Soloviev M, Rummel A, Bigalke H, Suckling J, Ushkaryov Y,  Naumenko N, Shakirzyanova A, Giniatullin R, Maywood E, Hastings M, Binz T, Davletov B.
   ‘SNARE tagging allows step-wise assembly of a multimodular medicinal toxin’
   Proc Nat Acad Sci  USA (2010) 107, 18197-201

Contact details:

Professor Bazbek Davletov

Email: B.Davletov@sheffield.ac.uk

Web: http://www.sheffield.ac.uk/bms/research/davletov