SUPERVISOR: Chris OOSTENBRINK

PROJECT ASSIGNED TO: Nadine GRUNDSCHOBER

Up to the year 2022, at least 12 natural serotypes and over 100 variants of adeno-associated viruses (AAVs) have been isolated and studied as gene delivery vehicles and, from these vectors, AAV mutants have continuously been generated to optimize the use of AAV for gene delivery. Nevertheless, with the increasing number of engineered rAAV variants created by the scientific community to optimize gene of interest (GOI) transduction into the target organ, there is a need to better understand the impact of the current and future AAV structure and structure modifications on the molecular properties.

The aim of the project is to use the acquired knowledge to reduce the number of required experiments to optimize AAV purification and protein stability among others in the presence of different buffers. This will be done through computational methods supplemented by experimental data.