Gergely Maróti PhD#

AFFILIATION: Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Biological Research Center
LINK TO WEBPAGE: http://www.brc.hu/biochem_microbial_genomics.php
FIELD OF SCHOLARSHIP: Biology

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE:

PhD in Biology (2005), University of Szeged, Hungary
Title of thesis: Insights into the assembly of NiFe hydrogenases
Post-Doctoral position at the J. Craig Venter Institute, Rockville, Maryland, USA. Member of the Synthetic Biology & Bioenergy Team led by the Nobel-Laureate Hamilton O. Smith.
Associate Professor at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Biological Research Center since 2012. More than 70 international publications in the field of microbiology.

DETAILS OF RESEARCH:

Symbiotic interactions range from very tight (e.g. organelle endosymbioses) to diffuse associations (e.g. co-localization) with a broad spectrum in between (e.g. predation, parasitism, commensalism, mutualism). These interactions involve elaborate communication between the partners at the cellular level. Our major goal is the discovery of the potential of selected living interactions as specific sources of useful biomolecules and metabolites (e.g. antimicrobial peptides -AMPs-, biofuels, biomaterials, etc.). Microbial associations of various levels are analyzed in details and interrogated for the presence of such products.

THREE KEY PUBLICATION REFERENCES:

Farkas A., Maróti G., Kereszt A. and Kondorosi É. (2017) Comparative analysis of the bacterial membrane disruption effect of two natural plant antimicrobial peptides. Frontiers in Microbiology 8:51, doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2017.00051

Lakatos G., Deák Zs., Vass I., Rétfalvi T., Rozgonyi Sz., Rákhely G., Ördög V., Kondorosi É. and Maróti G. (2014) Bacterial symbionts enhance photo-fermentative hydrogen evolution of Chlamydomonas algae. Green Chemistry 16 (11), 4716 - 4727. doi:10.1039/C4GC00745J

Farkas A., Maróti G., Dürgő H., Györgypál Z., Lima R.M., Medzihradszky K.F., Kereszt A., Mergaert P. and Kondorosi É. (2014) The Medicago truncatula symbiotic peptide NCR247 contributes to bacteroid differentiation through multiple mechanisms. PNAS 111:5183-88