University of Groningen
ACV synthetase: a unique member of the nonribosomal peptide synthetases family
Iacovelli, Riccardo
DOI:
10.33612/diss.156838414
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Publication date: 2021
Link to publication in University of Groningen/UMCG research database
Citation for published version (APA):
Iacovelli, R. (2021). ACV synthetase: a unique member of the nonribosomal peptide synthetases family. University of Groningen. https://doi.org/10.33612/diss.156838414
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Acknowledgements
About the author
List of publications
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Acknowledgements
Aknowledgements
Six years have passed since I came to Groningen for the first time. It sounds like a very long time, but looking back now it feels like it just flew away. During these years I had a fantastic time in the Molecular Microbiology department, and I had the opportunity to grow as a person and as a scientist, forge fantastic friendships and meet a lot of great people. And now I want to thank them all for the huge support they have been to me.
First of all, I would like to thank my supervisor Arnold for giving me the opportunity to join the MolMic group back when I was a Master student from Rome, and later continue my journey as a PhD candidate. Your guidance was instrumental for the completion of this thesis. I have always enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere of our meetings, where you gave me freedom to develop and pursue my own ideas. Most importantly though, you taught me to be independent right from the get-go, which I am sure it will prove to be a valuable lesson in my future career. Lastly, I really enjoyed all the casual chatting during borrels, Xmas dinners and other off-work gatherings. I hope that when the pandemic eventually subsides you will keep organizing such occasions. But remember not to give alcohol-free beer to Niels, this time I won’t be there to help you handle him!
I also want to thank my co-supervisor Roel. I am thankful for all those times where you’d just drop by the office and take the time to discuss an idea or go through a paper together. Even though we only met a few times a month, your positive feedback and encouraging words helped me overcome many obstacles and ultimately achieve my goals.
A word of thanks goes also to Dirk-Jan. I worked on something rather different from your area of research, but your comments and constructive feedback often provided me with a fresh perspective on the topic. I very much
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enjoyed our competition in having the loudest music in the office, you have great taste and surely were a noteworthy opponent!
A very special thanks goes to my paranymphs, my friends László and
Marten. Laci, I still remember when we first met at the beginning of it all,
more than six years ago. We could barely speak English with each other, and our early interactions revolved around going down to the canteen to go buy that fantastic Unox goulash soup. As our projects progressed (and our English improved) we became good colleagues and friends, and I was really sad to see you go back home after a few months. Little did I know that you would come back and I’d have to spend 5 years with you sneezing and coughing as loud as an airplane engine and smashing things all over the place. Jokes aside, I am happy to have had you alongside me in this journey, you were and are an awesome friend and I am thankful for all the things we did together. The water gun fights, Lowlands, the road trip in US, those unbelievable olive oil-massages in Greece, all the bros nights, these are only some of the things I will never forget. And, at last, we managed to achieve our dream of publishing a paper together, I could have not asked for a better ending. Thanks for being here until the very end my man! Marten, when I first saw you, I really couldn’t help but notice your striking resemblance to Arnold. For a few weeks I really thought you were his son (the fact that you two had basically the same haircut certainly didn’t help). Of course, as soon as I learned your surname (Exterkate), I knew that this wasn’t the case, since you definitely have origins in the Basque Country (I am telling you, you should investigate this further!). I still remember that when I was a Master student, especially in the beginning, it was a bit difficult for me to interact with the PhD students, as they already had a tight group. Well, you broke that barrier effortlessly, and became right away one of my favorite persons in the lab. When I came back for my PhD, we quickly became very good friends and since then we shared a lot of unforgettable experiences, including concerts
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(we saw one of The Beatles together!), festivals, football evenings, parties, volley matches and more. And I really hope there will be many more to come! I always appreciated our conversations about life and your precious advices at work, thanks for all the time we spent together man! (Just so you know, I could have easily written this in Dutch, given my honorary C2 proficiency level, but “De Kevers” sounded pretty bad).
Niels and André, if there could be four paranymphs, you’d be sitting next to
me on the defense date! For different reasons, when I first met you guys, I had no idea we could become such good friends. Niels, you had this way of being very direct and a know-it-all right from the start, which admittedly was something I wasn’t used to. Well, 4 years later here we are and yes, you can be a handful (a PITA, as you like to write), but you are also a great colleague and friend. I am thankful for all your precious advices at work, but also for all the time we spent together outside of work: movie nights, boardgames, the beers at Bax with the boys, the BBQs. But the thing I am grateful for the most is surely having watched you spin that hula hoop like a professional gymnast, images that will forever be impressed in my memory. Keep shaking it, killer!
André, it was really nice to have you around at work. Conversations at the
lunch table could go literally anywhere when you were there, you know so many facts about random and weird things (only Niels can compete with you on that)! Your summer outfits are probably the best (and weirdest at the same time) I have seen in my entire time in MolMic, and the fact that you could pull off so many different styles of moustache only adds to that. In time, we became great friends and I am so happy to have been there in such important moments like your PhD defense and your wedding! I really enjoyed our trips to Germany and Greece, hiking in the Itaimbezinho canyon, the Christmas in Italy (you are basically a legend among my friends and my relatives) and all the time we spent together in Groningen. I hope to see you soon again. Semo tutti Italiani!
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In the six years I spent here, I had the pleasure of meeting so many other people that made this journey a whole lot more enjoyable. Paula and
Stephanie, thanks for keeping in line Niels and André, respectively. You both
always welcomed me at your places and I really enjoyed our time together.
Steph, thanks for all the interesting conversations, the tips about music, the
many advices you gave me along the way, and for hosting me in Uruguay. I still dream of your dad’s farinata! Sabrina, thanks for all the memories we made together, I always enjoyed your company and going to parties and concerts with you. I hope that spending enough time with me made you finally stop eating ketchup on pasta. Also thank you for letting me try pole dancing at your place, that’s when I learned I should definitely never do that in public. Zsofi, Carsten, Annarita, Fernando, the Heroes of MolMic, it was great to have you around! I am sure that years from now our picture will still be there, and the new students will be wondering who are those cool guys in a lab coat, on the edge of a cliff, waving pipettes at the sky! Alex, you were my best student and your work was crucial in the making of chapter 3. I appreciate the friendship that was born from that, and I hope we can soon hit the gym together once again!
Rianne, Alicia, Max, you guys have been killing it with the borrel committee,
thank you for all the fun things you planned during this last year! Rianne, thanks for all the nice and interesting conversations and for convincing me to get motorbike lessons, I am looking forward to riding together one day!
Alicia, you are my rightful heir in Molmic, with your uncontainable energy
and the right amount of loudness. You’re a fun person to have around, and I hope we’ll still have plenty of occasions to hang out. Max, although we practically live in two different time zones, I enjoyed our time together in the lab and I am sure that you’ll do great.
Alka and Parichita, thanks for all the funny moments and for introducing me
to some delicious Indian food. I also loved learning more about your country’s traditions and culture (especially dancing, which I immediately mastered, and
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cinema: I just will never forget the scene of the guy taking down a whole platoon of soldiers with a banana, simply genius). I hope you will not gossip too much about me once I am gone! Aleksandra, thanks for the fun parties (especially the costume parties!), all the nice chats and for teaching me how to squat properly. Xiaohuan, you’re the most energetic and positive person I ever met, seeing your ponytail dashing forth and back along the corridors always put me in a good mood. Keep it up! Mirthe, thanks for the tips, the nice conversations, and for teaching me that I should not juggle with mandarins at the lunch table.
Marten, Alicia, Rianne, Laci, Pedro, Lucia, Niels, Aleksandra, Lin, Xiaouhan, Parichita, thank you all for the great time we had on Ameland, it
was easily one of the best weekends during my time in Molmic!
Janny and Greetje, thank you for keeping the lab running and for all your
help whenever I needed it. Greetje, thank you for helping me out with the last experiments, it was a huge support! Bea and Anmara, thank you for taking care of all the administrative aspects of this PhD, and especially Anmara, thank you for guiding me through the steps required for defending my thesis! I also want to mention all the other MolMicians who contributed to keeping a friendly and pleasant atmosphere during my PhD: Sonja, Jeroen, Yvonne,
Reto, Ciprian, Min, Amalina, Ana, Danae, Irfan, Sasha, thank you!
During my stay in Groningen I have also met a lot of people outside of MolMic with whom I shared lots of good moments. Tycho, Vicky, Lisanne, Minh,
Luiza, Diego, Fleur, it was always a blast spending time with you guys at
parties, hanging outdoor in the summer, or playing sports. I cannot wait for the new beach volley season to start! Vicky, my favorite squash buddy (every victory with you feels just as good as the first one), a special thanks to you for all the nice, funny and unpredictable conversations we have, I am glad to have you as a friend. Barbara, thanks for the random visits and chats in the office, it was always nice to go full Italian style once in a while!
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Of course, I also want to thank all of my friends from Italy for being a constant (albeit often virtual) presence in my life. Even though you all live far, I really enjoyed your visits, the holidays at home, all the trips and our conversations.
Cef, Luca (Naso), Valentino, Gino (Pelatodimmè), Fenni, Met, Matteo, Luca (Tisana), tutti i Visualizzatori e gli amici di Biotec, grazie!
Ultimi ma non ultimi, voglio ringraziare la mia famiglia. Nonno Franco e
Nonna Maria, insieme a Nonna Luisa mi avete cresciuto e siete sempre
stati presenti in ogni occasione importante della mia vita, e ve ne sarò sempre grato. Grazie anche a tutti gli zii e i cugini, è sempre bello avere una famiglia numerosa che ti accoglie nelle occasioni di festa!
I miei fratelli Federico ed Edoardo, anche se forse non ve ne siete mai resi conto, vi ho sempre presi come esempio. Dove Fede ha sicuramente contribuito alla mia scelta di intraprendere questa carriera, e mi ha sempre aiutato e consigliato in ambito PhD, Edo mi ha sempre aiutato nelle situazioni personali e a credere in me stesso ogni volta che ho dubitato delle mie scelte. Grazie Iachi, spero che nessuna distanza potrà mai separarci! P.S. Vi aspetto per un megatorneo di PES e birrozze complementari, siete avvertiti.
Infine, un grazie speciale a mamma e papà. È vero che siamo gli artefici del nostro destino, ma allo stesso tempo se sono arrivato fino a qui è anche e soprattutto grazie a voi. Tutto quello che mi avete insegnato mi ha reso la persona che sono oggi senza dubbio. Mamma, mi hai sempre supportato e, con la tua forza, ispirato ad andare avanti sempre e ad apprezzare le cose che contano nella vita. Papà, mi hai insegnato ad essere curioso e a coltivare la fantasia e le passioni personali. Anche se te ne sei andato presto, il tempo che abbiamo trascorso tutti e cinque insieme per me varrá sempre come una vita intera, e non lo dimenticherò mai. Questa tesi è dedicata a voi!
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About the author
About the author
Riccardo Iacovelli was born on November 7th 1991,
in the city of Tivoli, Italy. After graduating from the
Liceo Scientifico Ettore Majorana (Guidonia, Rome) in
2010, he immediately enrolled in the Bachelor course of Biotechnology. Three years later, he decided to further specialize and sign up for the Master program in Industrial Biotechnology. During the second year, he had the opportunity to apply for an Erasmus+ mobility grant, to visit a European University and perform his Master’s thesis project. Given the interest in industrial biotech, he joined the department of Molecular Microbiology to work on the engineering of nonribosomal peptide synthetases under the supervision of Prof. Arnold Driessen. At the end of the project, the possibility to continue the research with these enzymes presented itself and a project plan for a PhD was conceived. After a brief return in Rome to complete the last exams and the official graduation ceremony, Riccardo came back to Groningen to start his PhD in the Molecular Microbiology department in December 2015. His research, involving the characterization and engineering of the ACV synthetase enzyme, was completed in the summer of 2020 and the results are described in this thesis. In March 2021, Riccardo will join the group of Dr. Kristina Haslinger in the chemical and pharmaceutical biology department, to pursue a postdoc in the field of natural product discovery and biosynthetic pathway engineering.
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List of publicationsList of publications
Iacovelli R., Zwahlen R. D., Bovenberg R. A. L., Driessen A. J. M. (2020)
Biochemical characterization of the Nocardia lactamdurans ACV synthetase. PLoS ONE 15(4): e0231290. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0231290
Iacovelli R., Mózsik L., Bovenberg R. A. L., Driessen A. J. M.
Identification of a conserved N-terminal domain in the first module of ACV synthetases. MicrobiologyOpen (in press)
Iacovelli R., Bovenberg R. A. L., Driessen A. J. M.
Nonribosomal peptide synthetases and β-lactams in Penicillium rubens: current knowledge and perspectives (provisional). Manuscript in preparation.
Iacovelli R., Prats Luján A., Berrelkamp G, Bovenberg R. A. L., Driessen A. J. M.
Investigations on the binding pocket of the L-α-aminoadipic acid-specific
adenylation domain of the Nocardia lactamdurans ACV synthetase (provisional).
