Recognition and Disposal of Misfolded Seed Proteins

This project was directed at determining mechanisms involved in storage of intrinsic and foreign storage proteins in seeds. Seeds constitute the majority of direct and indirect food. Understanding how seeds store proteins is important to design approaches to improve the quality of seed proteins through biotechnology. In the Israeli part of this project we have conducted investigations to elucidate the mechanisms involved in assembling wheat storage proteins into ER-derived protein bodies. The results obtained have shown how domains of storage protein molecules are critical in the assembly of protein bodies. In the US side of this project the fate of foreign and engineered proteins expressed in seeds has been investigated. Engineering seed proteins offers the prospect of improving the quality of crops. Many foreign proteins are unstable when expressed in transgenic seeds. The results obtained have demonstrated that sequestering foreign proteins in the ER or ER-derived protein bodies stabilizes the proteins permitting their accumulation. The collaboration conducted in this project has advanced the understanding how protein bodies are assembled and the potential to use the ER and protein bodies to store engineered proteins that can enhance the composition of seeds.