Background
With the development of global economy in the latest demands of energy in world, an average Taiwanese produces around 2.58 metric tons of carbon emission a year.
This number far surpasses those of China, Japan and South Korea.
Our project, as a result, works to use biofuel as an alternative fossil fuel to reduce the current energy crisis.
In our lab, we use microalgae as the source of biofuel since they have the greatest capability of producing large amount of oil.
Our project aims to increase oil accumulation through nitrogen starvation, which was brought up in a research we came upon.
Under nitrogen starvation, de novo synthesis of triacylglycerol from acyl-CoA increases.
Acyl moieties derived from the degradation of membrane lipids then recycle into triacylglycerol, increasing carbon flux towards glycerol-3 -phosphate and acyl-CoA for fatty acid synthesis.
As such, the oil accumulation under nitrogen starvation will increase.
There are currently two types of cultivated systems: open-pond and closed bioreactors.
While open-pond costs way lower than closed bioreactors, open-pond cultivate microalgae is with significantly lower oil contents.
Many microalgae farms today cultivate microalgae in closed ponds, where regulations are made to keep the nitrogen level low.
This method, though, consumes lots of energy due to the need to maintain proper temperature, nutrition, light, and other growing factors.
We want to develop a new method that allows microalgae to reach nitrogen starvation in open-pond, and thus reaching the same effectiveness of closed bioreactors with the affordable price of open-pond.