Kwon J.


 Kwon
Postdoc Research Associate
Office: Biotech Building  4117
Telephone: 518-276-4216
Fax: 518-276-2207
E-mail: kwonsj2@rpi.edu
Mailing   
Address:		 Dept. of Chemical and Biological Engineering
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies, Room 4211
110 8th Street
Troy, NY 12180-3590
 Background | Research Area | Publications | Highlights | Honors
Curriculum Vitae

Background

Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), South Korea

     Ph. D. (1998. 2) Biocatalysis and Bioengineering (Prof. Joon Shick Rhee)

Dissertational title: Application of Pervaporation to Lipase-Catalyzed Esterification in Organic Solvent.

Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), South Korea

     M. S. (1994. 2) Biocatalysis and Biotransformations (Prof. Joon Shick Rhee)

Dissertational title: Enzymatic Synthesis of Mono-, or Diacylglycerol in Organic Solvent.

Yonsei University, South Korea

      B. S. (1992. 2) Food Engineering

                                                                                                                                              

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Research area

Nature gives us enormous chemical diversity derived from the combinatorial pathway of metabolic enzyme repertoire. Drug discovery from the diversity of many natural products have been central in the field of medicinal chemistry 1 and metabolic engineering 2-5. However, many potential drug compounds are not addressable because of trace amounts in natural sources and limit the scope for making chemical modifications to optimize their therapeutic use 6. My research goals are how to answer the following questions.

 

  1. How can natural products be efficiently accessed?
  2. How can ‘unnatural’ natural products be efficiently generated from different building block?
  3. How can natural products and their derivatives be systematically synthesized?
  4. How can natural products and natural-product-derived molecules be systematically evaluated as drug candidates?

                                                                                                                                

 

1.         Charest, M.G., Lerner, C.D., Brubaker, J.D., Siegel, D.R. & Myers, A.G. A convergent enantioselective route to structurally diverse 6-deoxytetracycline antibiotics. Science 308, 395-398 (2005).

2.         Khosla, C. & Keasling, J.D. Metabolic engineering for drug discovery and development. Nat Rev Drug Discov 2, 1019-1025 (2003).

3.         Pfeifer, B.A., Admiraal, S.J., Gramajo, H., Cane, D.E. & Khosla, C. Biosynthesis of complex polyketides in a metabolically engineered strain of E. coli. Science 291, 1790-1792 (2001).

4.         Schmidt-Dannert, C., Umeno, D. & Arnold, F.H. Molecular breeding of carotenoid biosynthetic pathways. Nat Biotechnol 18, 750-753 (2000).

5.         Watanabe, K., Rude, M.A., Walsh, C.T. & Khosla, C. Engineered biosynthesis of an ansamycin polyketide precursor in Escherichia coli. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 100, 9774-9778 (2003).

6.         Clardy, J. & Walsh, C. Lessons from natural molecules. Nature 432, 829-837 (2004).

                                                                                     

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Publications

   
  1. Kwon, S. J., Lee, M. Y., Ku, B., Dordick J. S. (2006) In vitro metabolic pathway engineering for natural product drug discovery Nat. Chem. Biol. (In preparation)
  2. Kwon, S. J., Jung, H. C., Pan, J. G. (2006) Spore-displayed enzymes for phase transfer biocatalysis. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. (Submitted)
  3. Ralf, R., Kwon, S. J., Schmidt-Dannert, C. (2006) Function analysis of YlnDEF from B. subtilis and expanding the porphyrin compound repertoire using metabolic engineering (In preparation).
  4. DiTursi, M. K., Kwon, S. J., Dordick, J. S. (2006) Bioinformatics-driven, rational engineering of protein thermostability. Protein Eng. (In press)
  5. Ku, B., Cha, J., Srivasan, A., Kwon, S. J., Jeong, J. C., Sherman, D. H., Dordick, J. S. (2006) Chip-based polyketide biosynthesis and functionalization. Biotechnol. Prog. 22:1202
  6. Jung, H. C., Kwon, S. J., Pan, J. G. (2006) Display of a thermostable lipase on the surface of a solvent-resistant bacterium, Pseudomonas putida GM730, and its applications for whole-cell biocatalysis. BMC Biotechnol. 6:23
  7. Kwon, S. J., Song, J. J., Lee, Y. J., (2005) Signal Pathway of HIF-1a Phosphorylation And Its Interaction With pVHL in MiaPaCa-2 Pancreatic Cancer Cells During Ischemia. Clin. Cancer Res.  11: 7607-7613  
  8. Kwon, S. J., Lee, Y. J. (2005) Effect of Low Glutamine/Glucose on Hypoxia-induced Elevation of HIF-1alpha in Human Pancreatic Cancer MiaPaCa-2 and Human Prostatic Cancer DU-145 Cells.  Clin. Cancer Res.  11: 4694-4700  
  9. Lee, Y. J., Moon, M. S., Kwon, S. J., Rhee, J. G. (2005) Hypoxia and low glucose differentially augments TRAIL-induced apoptotic death. Mol. Cell. Biochem. 270: 89-97
  10. Kwon, S. J., Petri, R., de Boer, A. L., Schmidt-Dannert, C. (2004) A high-throughput screen for porphyrin metal chelatase: Application to the directed evolution of ferrochelatase for metalloporphyrin biosynthesis. ChemBioChem 5: 1069-1074
  11. Baek, D. H., Song, J. J., Kwon, S. J., Park, C., Jung, C. M., Sung, M. H. (2004) Characteristics of a New Enantioselective Thermostable Dipeptidase from Brevibacillus borstelensis BCS-1 and Its Application to Synthesis of a D-Amino-Acid-Containing Dipeptide. Appl. Environ. Microbiol. 70: 1570-1575
  12. Kwon, S. J., de Boer, A. L., Petri, R., Schmidt-Dannert, C. (2003) High-level production of porphyrins in metabolically engineered Escherichia coli: systematic extension of a pathway assembled from overexpressed genes involved in heme biosynthesis. Appl. Environ. Microbiol. 69: 4875-4883
  13. Baek, D. H., Kwon, S. J., Hong, S. P., Kwak, M. S., Lee, M. H. Song, J. J., Lee, S. G., Yoon, K. H., Sung, M. H. (2003) Characterization of a thermostable D-stereospecific alanine amidase from Brevibacillus borstelensis BCS-1. Appl. Environ. Microbiol. 69: 980-986
  14. Baek, D. H., Song, J. J., Lee, S. G., Kwon, S. J., Asano, Y., Sung, M. H. (2003) New thermostable D-methionine amidase from Brevibacillus borstelensis BCS-1 and its application for D-phenylalanine production.  Enzyme Microb. Technol. 32: 131-139
  15. Kwon, S. J. (2001) Physico-, and chemical modification of enzymes for the efficient biotransformations. Bioindustry News (Korean language) 14: 23-32
  16. Rhee, J. S., Kwon, S. J., Han, J. J. (2001) pp135-150 Water activity control in lipase-catalyzed reactions in non-aqueous media. Enzymes in Nonaqueous Solvents: Methods and Protocols (Methods in Biotechnology, Vol 15) edited by Vulfson, E. N., Halling, P. J., Holland, H. L. (Humana Press).
  17. Park, C. W., Kwon, S. J., Rhee, J. S. (2000) Transesterification of phosphatidylcholine with eicosapentaenoic acid ethyl ester using Phospholipase A2 in organic solvent. Biotechnol. Lett. 22:147-150
  18. Kwon, S. J., Baek, D. H., Lee, S. G., Sung, M. H. (1999) Simple and rapid screening methods for microorganisms having D-stereospecific peptidase and esterase activity. Biotechnol. Technique 13: 653-655
  19. Baek, D. H., Kwon, S. J., Lee, S. G., Sung, M. H. (1999) Discovery of D-stereospecific dipeptidase from thermophilic Bacillus sp. BCS-1 and its application for the synthesis of D-amino acid-containing peptide. J. Microbiol. Biotechnol. 9: 646-649
  20. Rhee, J. S., Kwon, S. J. (1998) Water activity control in lipase-catalyzed reaction system. J. Microbiol. Biotechnol. 8: 191-196
  21. Jang, Y., Han, J. J., Kwon, S. J., Rhee, J. S. (1998) Low-calorie structured lipid synthesis by lipase-catalyzed transesterification. Ann. N. Y. Acad. Sci. 864:313-317
  22. Kwon, S. J., Rhee, J. S. (1998) On-off dewatering control for lipase-catalyzed synthesis of n-butyl oleate in n-hexane by tubular type pervaporation system. J. Microbiol. Biotechnol. 8: 165-170
  23. Kwon, S. J., Song, K. M., Hong, W. H., Rhee, J. S. (1995) Removal of water produced from lipase-catalyzed esterification in organic solvent by pervaporation. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 46: 393-395
  24. Kwon, S. J., Han, J. J., Rhee, J. S. (1995) Production and in situ separation of mono- or diacylglycerol catalyzed by lipases in n-hexane. Enzyme Microb. Technol. 17: 700-704
  25. Kwon, S. J., Lee, S. Y., Cho, S. W., Rhee, J. S. (1993) A rapid gas chromatography method for quantitation of free fatty acids, monoacyl-, diacyl-, and triacylglycerols without derivatization. Biotechol. Techniques 7: 727-732

Patents

Schmidt-Dannert, C, de Boer, A. L., Kwon, S. J. (2005) WO 2005/012498 A2 Genetically engineered bacteria for production of porphyrins.

Kwon, S. J., Choi, S. K., Jung, H. C., Pan, J. G., Chang, J. S., Park, T. J. (2003) WO 03/102203 A1 Stabilized biocatalysts and methods of bioconversion using the same.

Sung, M. H., Lee, S. G., Kwon, S. J., Baek, D. H., Hong, S. P., Cho, S. H., Jung, M. H. (2001) WO 01/70937 A1. A new thermostable D-stereospecific dipeptidase from Brevibacillus bostelensis BCS-1 and its use as a biocatalyst for the synthesis of peptides containing D-amino acids.

Sung, M. H., Lee, S. G., Baek, D. H., Kwon, S. J., Hong, S. P., Kwak, M. S. Yoon, K. H. (2001) WO 01/57197 A1. A new thermophilic bacterium Brevibacillus bostelensis BCS-1 and a thermostable D-stereospecific amino acide amidase produced from therefrom.

Jang, Y., Han, J. J., Kwon, S. J., Rhee, J. S. (1998) Korea Patent 98-13145.  Synthesis of low-calorie structured lipid using lipase (Korean language).

                 Kwon, S. J., Rhee, J. S. (1995) Korea Patent 94-6987. The Synthesis of Glycerides using lipase in organic solvents 
                  (Korean language).                                                                                        

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Research Highlights

Bionanotechnology

Combinatorial enzyme reaction in micro chip for drug discovery

Microfluidic chip-based displacement chromatography for proteomics

Gene/protein delivery using nanomaterials

High throughput screening of target proteins using 3-D cell chip 

Cancer biology

  1. Apototic signal pathways in pancreatic cancer cell during hypoxia-ischemia
  2. High throughput protein-protein interaction analysis

Metabolite biosynthesis

  1. Gene cloning and expression
  2. Directed evolution of enzymes
  3. Development of assay systems for high-throughput screening
  4. Metabolic pathway engineering
  5. Combinatorial biosynthesis
  6. Enzyme reaction mechanism

Biocatalysis for organic synthesis 

  1. Regio-, and stereoselective synthesis using biocatalysts
  2. Biotransformations in organic solvents
  3. Chemical modification of enzymes
                                                                                                                                                 

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Honors & Awards

 

 Oh-Woon Scholarship (KOLON Inc.) in Korea 1990-1992

The American Oil Chemists’ Society (AOCS) Award in U.S.A., 1996/97

Research Fellowship Award from Korea Science and Engineering Foundation (KOSEF) in Korea 1998/1999


Membership

American Society for Microbiology (ASM)

American Chemical Society (ACS)
                                                                                                                            

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