André Damasio

André Damasio
Verified
André verified their affiliation via an institutional email.
Verified
André verified their affiliation via an institutional email.
State University of Campinas (UNICAMP) | UNICAMP · Department of Biochemistry and Tissue Biology

PhD in Biochemistry

About

157
Publications
33,551
Reads
How we measure 'reads'
A 'read' is counted each time someone views a publication summary (such as the title, abstract, and list of authors), clicks on a figure, or views or downloads the full-text. Learn more
3,877
Citations
Introduction
André Damasio is Associate Professor at the Department of Biochemistry and Tissue Biology, Institute of Biology, University of Campinas (UNICAMP). His research focuses on microbial biotechnology. The current projects are dedicated to the genetic engineering of fungal strains for the secretion of client proteins and the function of glycosylation in the folding and secretion of plant cell wall-degrading enzymes.
Additional affiliations
March 2010 - September 2010
Spanish National Research Council
Position
  • Researcher
November 2013 - June 2015
Centro Nacional de Pesquisa em Energia e Materiais
Position
  • Young Investigator
January 2009 - July 2009
Oklahoma State University
Position
  • Researcher

Publications

Publications (157)
Article
Full-text available
The extraction of hydroxycinnamic acids (HCADs) is a strategy for lignocellulosic biomass valorization due to their high value-added nature and the possibility of application as flavoring and antioxidants. This study proposes correlations between the composition and taxonomy of 28 globally available agro-industrial feedstocks with the production of...
Article
Full-text available
Background Fermentation of sugars derived from plant biomass feedstock is crucial for sustainability. Hence, utilizing customized enzymatic cocktails to obtain oligosaccharides instead of monomers is an alternative fermentation strategy to produce prebiotics, cosmetics, and biofuels. This study developed an engineered strain of Aspergillus niger pr...
Article
Abstract Plastics derived from fossil fuels are used ubiquitously owing to their exceptional physicochemical characteristics. However, the extensive and short-term use of plastics has caused environmental challenges. The biotechnological plastic conversion can help address the challenges related to plastic pollution, offering sustainable alternativ...
Article
Full-text available
Aspergillus fumigatus represents a public health problem due to the high mortality rate in immunosuppressed patients and the emergence of antifungal-resistant isolates. Protein acetylation is a crucial post-translational modification that controls gene expression and biological processes. The strategic manipulation of enzymes involved in protein ac...
Article
Full-text available
Trichoderma erinaceum is a filamentous fungus that was isolated from decaying sugarcane straw at a Brazilian ethanol biorefinery. This fungus shows potential as a source of plant cell wall-degrading enzymes (PCWDEs). In this study, we conducted a comprehensive multiomics investigation of T. erinaceum to gain insights into its enzymatic capabilities...
Article
Full-text available
In 1999, the first biosynthetic gene cluster (BGC), synthesizing the virulence factor DHN melanin, was characterized in Aspergillus fumigatus. Since then, 19 additional BGCs have been linked to specific secondary metabolites (SMs) in this species. Here, we provide a comprehensive timeline of A. fumigatus BGC discovery and find that initial advances...
Article
Full-text available
The COVID-19 pandemic was initiated by the rapid spread of a SARS-CoV-2 strain. Though mainly classified as a respiratory disease, SARS-CoV-2 infects multiple tissues throughout the human body, leading to a wide range of symptoms in patients. To better understand how SARS-CoV-2 affects the proteome from cells with different ontologies, this work ge...
Article
Full-text available
Simultaneous intracellular depolymerization of xylo-oligosaccharides (XOS) and acetate fermentation by engineered Saccharomyces cerevisiae offers significant potential for more cost-effective second-generation (2G) ethanol production. In the present work, the previously engineered S. cerevisiae strain, SR8A6S3, expressing enzymes for xylose assimil...
Preprint
Full-text available
Protein acetylation is a crucial post-translational modification that controls gene expression and a variety of biological processes. Sirtuins, a prominent class of NAD+-dependent lysine deacetylases, serve as key regulators of protein acetylation and gene expression in eukaryotes. In this study, six single knockout strains of fungal pathogen Asper...
Article
Full-text available
The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the agent of a major global outbreak of respiratory tract disease known as Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). SARS-CoV-2 infects mainly lungs and may cause several immune-related complications, such as lymphocytopenia and cytokine storm, which are associated with the severity of...
Article
The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the agent of a major global outbreak of respiratory tract disease known as Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). SARS-CoV-2 infects mainly lungs and may cause several immune-related complications, such as lymphocytopenia and cytokine storm, which are associated with the severity of...
Article
The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the agent of a major global outbreak of respiratory tract disease known as Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). SARS-CoV-2 infects mainly lungs and may cause several immune-related complications, such as lymphocytopenia and cytokine storm, which are associated with the severity of...
Article
The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the agent of a major global outbreak of respiratory tract disease known as Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19). SARS-CoV-2 infects mainly lungs and may cause several immune-related complications, such as lymphocytopenia and cytokine storm, which are associated with the severity of...
Preprint
Full-text available
A bstract Simultaneous intracellular depolymerization of xylo-oligosaccharides (XOS) and acetate fermentation by engineered Saccharomyces cerevisiae offers an advance towards more cost-effective second-generation (2G) ethanol production. As xylan is one of the most abundant polysaccharides present in lignocellulosic residues, the transport and brea...
Article
Full-text available
Background Lignin is an attractive alternative for producing biobased chemicals. It is the second major component of the plant cell wall and is an abundant natural source of aromatic compounds. Lignin degradation using microbial oxidative enzymes that depolymerize lignin and catabolize aromatic compounds into central metabolic intermediates is a pr...
Article
Full-text available
Although increasing evidence confirms neuropsychiatric manifestations associated mainly with severe COVID-19 infection, long-term neuropsychiatric dysfunction (recently characterized as part of “long COVID-19” syndrome) has been frequently observed after mild infection. We show the spectrum of cerebral impact of severe acute respiratory syndrome co...
Article
Full-text available
Fungal lytic polysaccharide monooxygenases (LPMOs) are copper-dependent enzymes that boost plant biomass degradation in combination with glycoside hydrolases. Secretion of LPMO9s arsenal by Aspergillus nidulans is influenced by the substrate and time of induction.
Article
Full-text available
Wood-feeding termites effectively degrade plant biomass through enzymatic degradation. Despite their high efficiencies, however, individual glycoside hydrolases isolated from termites and their symbionts exhibit anomalously low effectiveness in lignocellulose degradation, suggesting hereto unknown enzymatic activities in their digestome. Herein, we...
Article
Full-text available
The biocatalytic production of fuels and chemicals from plant biomass represents an attractive alternative to fossil fuel-based refineries. In this context, the mining and characterization of novel biocatalysts can promote disruptive innovation opportunities in the field of lignocellulose conversion and valorization. In the present work, we conduct...
Article
Full-text available
The engineering of xylo-oligosaccharide-consuming Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains is a promising approach for more effective utilization of lignocellulosic biomass and the development of economic industrial fermentation processes. Extending the sugar consumption range without catabolite repression by including the metabolism of oligomers instead o...
Article
Lytic polysaccharide monooxygenases (LPMOs) are metalloenzymes that cleave structural polysaccharides through an oxidative mechanism. The enzymatic activity of LPMOs relies on the presence of a Cu2+ histidine-brace motif in their flat catalytic surface. Upon reduction by an external electron donor and in the presence of its co-substrates, O2 or H2O...
Article
A purified exo-polygalacturonase of Neosartorya glabra (EplNg) was successfully characterized. EplNg native presented 68.2 kDa, with 32% carbohydrate content. The deglycosylated form showed 46.3 kDa and isoelectric point 5.4. The identity of EplNg was confirmed as an exo-polygalacturonase class I (EC 3.2.1.67) using mass spectrometry and Western-Bl...
Article
Full-text available
The ongoing global pandemic caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is responsible for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), first described in Wuhan, China. A subset of COVID-19 patients has been reported to have acquired secondary infections by microbial pathogens, such as opportunistic fungal pathogens from the...
Article
Full-text available
Trichoderma reesei is one of the major producers of holocellulases. It is known that in T. reesei, protein production patterns can change in a carbon source-dependent manner. Here, we performed a phosphorylome analysis of T. reesei grown in the presence of sugarcane bagasse and glucose as carbon source. In presence of sugarcane bagasse, a total of...
Article
Full-text available
Background Wood-decay basidiomycetes are effective for the degradation of highly lignified and recalcitrant plant substrates. The degradation of lignocellulosic materials by brown-rot strains is carried out by carbohydrate-active enzymes and non-enzymatic Fenton mechanism. Differences in the lignocellulose catabolism among closely related brown rot...
Article
Lytic polysaccharide monooxygenases (LPMOs) are copper-dependent enzymes which catalyze the oxidative cleavage of polysaccharides. LPMOs belonging to the family 15 in the Auxiliary Activity (AA) class from the Carbohydrate-Active Enzyme database are found widespread across the Tree of Life, including viruses, algae, oomycetes and animals. Recently,...
Article
Full-text available
Glycoside hydrolases (GH) are involved in the degradation of a wide diversity of carbohydrates and present several biotechnological applications. Many GH families are composed of enzymes with a single well-defined specificity. In contrast, enzymes from the GH16 family can act on a range of different polysaccharides, including β-glucans and galactan...
Article
The plant cell wall is the most abundant carbon reservoir in nature and is a renewable source of biofuels. To break down this biomass and convert it into fermentable sugars, a set of multiple enzymes is needed. Here, we characterize the enzymatic repertoire necessary for the degradation of sugarcane bagasse “in natura” and pre-treated using Aspergi...
Article
It is urgent the transition from a fossil fuel-based economy to a sustainable bioeconomy, based on bioconversion technologies using renewable plant biomass feedstocks to produce high chemicals, bioplastics, and biofuels. β-Glucosidases are key enzymes responsible for degrading the plant cell wall polymers, as they cleave glucan-based oligo- and pol...
Preprint
Full-text available
COVID-19 patients may exhibit neuropsychiatric and neurological symptoms. We found that anxiety and cognitive impairment are manifested by 28-56% of SARS-CoV-2-infected individuals with mild respiratory symptoms and are associated with altered cerebral cortical thickness. Using an independent cohort, we found histopathological signs of brain damage...
Preprint
Full-text available
The ongoing global pandemic caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is responsible for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) first described from Wuhan, China. A subset of COVID-19 patients has been reported to have acquired secondary infections by microbial pathogens, such as fungal opportunistic pathogens from...
Preprint
Full-text available
COVID-19 patients may exhibit neuropsychiatric and/or neurological symptoms. We found that anxiety and cognitive impairment are manifested by 28-56% of SARS-CoV-2-infected individuals with mild or no respiratory symptoms and are associated with altered cerebral cortical thickness. Using an independent cohort, we found histopathological signs of bra...
Article
Enzymatic hydrolysis of lignocellulosic biomass accounts for 20–30% of the total cost of second-generation bioethanol production and many efforts have been made in recent years to overcome the high cost of enzymes. Using cello-oligosaccharides (COS), intermediates in cellulose conversion to glucose, may provide advantages over monomeric glucose fer...
Preprint
Full-text available
The severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the agent of a major global outbreak of respiratory tract disease known as coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19). SARS-CoV-2 infects the lungs and may cause several immune-related complications such as lymphocytopenia and cytokine storm which are associated with the severity of the d...
Article
COVID-19 can result in severe lung injury. It remained to be determined why diabetic individuals with uncontrolled glucose levels are more prone to develop the severe form of COVID-19. The molecular mechanism underlying SARS-CoV-2 infection and what determines the onset of the cytokine storm found in severe COVID-19 patients are unknown. Monocytes/...
Preprint
Full-text available
Background: Wood-decay basidiomycetes are effective for the degradation of highly lignified and recalcitrant substrates. Brown-rot strains produce carbohydrate-active enzymes involved in the degradation of lignocellulosic materials, along with a non-enzymatic mechanism via Fenton reaction. Differences in the lignocellulose metabolism among closely...
Article
Sugarcane straw (SS) is a widely available agricultural processing feedstock with the potential to produce 2nd generation bioethanol and bioproducts, in addition to the more conventional use for heat and/or electrical power generation. In this study, we investigated the operational parameters to maximize the production of xylo-oligosaccharides (XOS...
Preprint
Full-text available
HIGHLIGHTS • Elevated glucose levels directly promote viral replication and cytokine expression. • Aerobic glycolysis is necessary to sustain CoV-2 replication in monocytes and CoV-2-induced monocyte response. • Mitochondrial ROS/HIF-1α axis is required for the induction of glycolysis and the consequent proinflammatory state of CoV-2-infected monoc...
Article
Full-text available
Filamentous fungi are important cell factories for large‐scale enzyme production. However, production levels are often low, and this limitation has stimulated research focusing on the manipulation of genes with predicted function in the protein secretory pathway. This pathway is the major route for the delivery of proteins to the cell exterior, and...
Article
In recent years, the intensification of the use of immunosuppressive therapies has increased the incidence of invasive infections caused by opportunistic fungi. Considering that, the spread of azole resistance and amphotericin B (AmB) inefficiency against some clinical and environmental isolates has been described. Thus, to avoid a global problem w...
Article
Full-text available
Background: β-Xylosidases are glycoside hydrolases (GHs) that cleave xylooligosaccharides and/or xylobiose into shorter oligosaccharides and xylose. Aspergillus nidulans is an established genetic model and good source of carbohydrate-active enzymes (CAZymes). Most fungal enzymes are N-glycosylated, which influences their secretion, stability, acti...
Article
Xylooligosaccharides (XOS) are non-digestible food ingredients with prebiotic properties for selectively promoting the growth of probiotics, which provide many health benefits and several applications in the food and pharmaceutical industry. The objective of this study was to optimize the concentration of commercial hemicellulases for the productio...
Article
Full-text available
Xylanases decrease the xylan content in pretreated biomass releasing it from hemicellulose, thus improving the accessibility of cellulose for cellulases. In this work, an endo-β-1,4-xylanase from Aspergillus fumigatus var. niveus (AFUMN-GH10) was successfully expressed. The structural analysis and biochemical characterization showed this AFUMN-GH10...
Article
Secretome evaluations of lignocellulose-decay basidiomycetes can reveal new enzymes in selected fungal species that degrade specific substrates. Proteins discovered in such studies can support biorefinery development. Brown-rot (Gloeophyllum trabeum) and white-rot (Pleurotus ostreatus) fungi growing in sugarcane bagasse solid-state cultures produce...
Article
Full-text available
Ferulic acid (FA), a low-molecular weight aromatic compound derived from lignin, represents a high-value molecule, used for applications in the cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries. FA can be further enzymatically converted in other commercially interesting molecules, such as vanillin and bioplastics. In several organisms, these transformations o...
Data
(A) HisTrapTMHP affinity chromatograpy profile. Green line indicates the linear gradient of buffer B (20 mM sodium phosphate buffer pH 7.0, 100 mM NaCl, 500 mM imidazole). Fractions 1 and 2 marked as red numbers were collected to further purification in size-exclusion chromatography. (B) Superdex 200 HiLoad 16/600 GL size exclusion chromatography....
Data
Spectral scanning of FA in different buffer systems. (A) 100 mM potassium phosphate buffer. (B) 20 mM ABF buffer. (C) Difference of absorbances in potassium phosphate and ABF buffers. 0.5 mM of FA was mixed with either 20 mM ABF buffer or 100 mM potassium phosphate buffer, pHs 5.8, 6.2, 6.6, 7.0, 7.4, 7.8, 8.0, 8.2, 8.6, 9.0, 9.4 and 9.8, in a fina...
Data
FCS1 kinetics (Michaelis-Menten plot). (TIF)
Data
Determination of FCS1 molecular weight. (A) Size exclusion chromatography (SEC) of purified FCS1 on Superdex-200. (B) Size distribution by intensity for purified FCS1 where dynamic light scattering (DLS) runs were performed at pH 7.0 and 20 oC. (TIF)
Data
The proposed catalytic activity of Fcs from FA. (TIF)
Data
Capillary zone electrophoresis of FCS1 enzymatic products at different alkaline pHs. Enzymatic reactions contained 1 mM FA and 10 μg purified enzyme. After incubation for 5 minutes at 37°C, the reactions were immediately diluted 1:10 in methanol 100%. All the measurements were made with the P/ACE MDQ capillary electrophoresis system (Beckman Coulte...
Data
Residual plots where the experimental intensity divided by computed intensity was plotted as a function of the scattering vector q. (A) Monomeric model. (B) Homodimeric model. (C) Dummy Atom Model (DAM). (TIF)
Article
Full-text available
Biotechnologists are interested in thermo tolerant fungi to manufacture enzymes active and stable at high temperatures, because they provide improved catalytic efficiency, strengthen enzyme substrate interactions, accelerate substrate enzyme conversion rates, enhance mass transfer, lower substrate viscosity, lessen contamination risk and offer the...