A new member of the HDCR-like nanowires forming enzymes has been found!
This fantastic aldehyde oxidoreductase does not only oxydize a high-spectrum of aldehydes, or performs the thermodinamically difficult opposite reaction, or is the most active W-hydrogenase reported so far. Like this was not enough, it also forms nanowires in a similar fashion as the HDCR.

Membrane-anchored HDCR nanowires drive hidrogen-powered CO2 fixation
Helge Dietrich#, Ricardo D. Righetto#, Anuj Kumar, Wojciech Wietrzynski, Raphael Trischler, Sandra K. Schuller, Jonathan Wagner, Fabian M. Schwarz, Benjamin D. Engel*, Volker Müller*, Jan M. Schuller*
Nature 2022
Electron highway for hydrogen and carbon dioxide storage discovered
Together with researchers from Frankfurt and Basel, we have shed light on the structure of an enzyme that produces formic acid from molecular hydrogen (H2) and carbon dioxide (CO2). The filamentous structure of the enzyme, now described at atomic level for the first time, acts like a nanowire and is evidently responsible for the extremely efficient conversion rates of the two gases. There is no other enzyme reported that converts CO2 to formate with a turnover rate even close to HDCR.

Structural basis for VIPP1 oligomerization and maintenance of thylakoid membrane integrity
Tilak Kumar Gupta#, Sven Klumpe#, Karin Gries#, Steffen Heinz#, Wojciech Wietrzynski#, Norikazu Ohnishi, Justus Niemeyer, Benjamin Spaniol, Miroslava Schaffer, Anna Rast, Matthias Ostermeier, Mike Strauss, Jürgen M. Plitzko, Wolfgang Baumeister, Till Rudack, Wataru Sakamoto, Jörg Nickelsen, Jan M. Schuller*, Michael Schroda*, Benjamin D. Engel*
Cell 2021
The molecular machine that forms the membranes of life!
In an amazing 6-lab cooperation we managed to determine the structure and mechanism of the major thylakoid membrane biogenesis factor VIPP1. Our work shows how this green ESCRT-III oligomer mediates membrane remodelling and repair.

Structural insights into photosystem II assembly
Jure Zabret#, Stefan Bohn#, Sandra K Schuller, Oliver Arnolds, Madeline Möller, Jakob Meier-Credo, Pasqual Liauw, Aaron Chan, Emad Tajkhorshid, Julian D Langer, Raphael Stoll, Anja Krieger-Liszkay, Benjamin D Engel, Till Rudack*, Jan M Schuller*, Marc M Nowaczyk*
Nature Plants 2021
How to build a molecular water splitting machine?
The first structural information on the biogenesis of PSII. We trapped the attachment of the CP43 light harvesting module and determined the high-resolution structure of it. Our work answers how a not yet fully assembled, but already partially active molecular machine is protected from photo damage. Great cooperation with our friends in the Nowaczyk lab. Our future work on this topic is supported by the Walter Benz foundation.

We could contribute the structure of the artifical enzyme glycolyl-CoA carboxylase (GCC), a new-to-nature enzyme to this exciting study by Tobi's lab.
A new-to-nature carboxylation module to improve natural and synthetic CO2 fixation
Marieke Scheffen, Daniel G Marchal, Thomas Beneyton, Sandra K Schuller, Melanie Klose, Christoph Diehl, Jessica Lehmann, Pascal Pfister, Martina Carrillo, Hai He, Selçuk Aslan, Niña S Cortina, Peter Claus, Daniel Bollschweiler, Jean-Christophe Baret, Jan M Schuller, Jan Zarzycki, Arren Bar-Even, Tobias J Erb.
Nature Catalysis 2021
Structural adaptations of photosynthetic complex I enable ferredoxin-dependent electron transfer
Jan M Schuller*, James A Birrell, Hideaki Tanaka, Tsuyoshi Konuma, Hannes Wulfhorst, Nicholas Cox, Sandra K Schuller, Jacqueline Thiemann, Wolfgang Lubitz, Pierre Sétif, Takahisa Ikegami, Benjamin D Engel, Genji Kurisu*, Marc M Nowaczyk*
Science 2019
