Difference between revisions of "Team:NYMU-Taipei/HP/Gold Integrated"

Improve the design of our product

We met with professionals to collect their suggestions. We went to the largest microalgae supplier company in Asia, whose CEO mentioned the multi-benefits of algae and encouraged us to tackle different methods to increase algae oil accumulation. This meeting inspired us to include another pathway -- Pigment -- to improve photosynthesis efficiency, thereby producing excess starch that can then be converted to oil. This ended up becoming more effective compared to our initial nitrogen starvation pathway.

Better our algae

 we went to Academia Sinica and learned how to maximize algae growth from a plant and microbial professor. We also spoke with Team Tokyo Tech, who inspired us to construct a plasmid containing Melanin (black pigment) sequence for maximizing light intake.

Integrated our testing

We further reviewed the pathway, device, and testing of our project with several professors at National Yang-Ming University. Based on Professor Chen’s advice, we enhance our device (for testing the growth environment) by adding cloud technology. To check the growing situation by measuring OD value, we acquire how to use the Photo-Bioreactor from Dr. Ya-Tang Yang (NTHU team).

After months of research on increasing the oil production in algae, we started to construct plasmids which would be used in our project. However, some question arose during the process of conducting our project：

• Except “denitrification”, is there any other pathway to increase oil production in algae?
• How to maximize the potential of algae and make it play a promising role in producing clean energy?
• What is the limitation that we haven’t discovered in producing biofuel from algae? Can we make effort to conquer it?

Seek the Profession

With the eagerness to find out appropriate and feasible answers to those questions, we were honored to meet with Far East Bio-Tec Company(FEBICO) in their headquarter on July.10 2017.

Far East Bio-Tec Company is the largest microalgae supplier in Asia, and its clients are located mostly in Japan, Europe, and the USA. Providing high-quality microalgae products to serve public's nutritional, cosmetic and biomedical needs is their primary mission.

Mr. C. C. Chiueh, the founder of FEBICO, met us in person. He not only gave us some professional suggestions from an enterprise view but also inspired us to find out more prospective ways to conduct our project.

Conclusion

(1.) International market trends and opportunities.
The price of petroleum is not very high in the current international market, so it seems to have less profit on producing biofuel. However, we can never underestimate the threat of energy consuming. The energy crisis is still visible in the upcoming future since a number of fossil fuels in the Earth is limited. Hence, it is not quite urgent but definitely imperative to develop sustainable energy sources. Microalgae oil may be a capable one of them. FEBICO once had the interest to join the green fuel plan proposed by the government of Taiwan.

(2.) The high added value in algae FEBICO has its dependent in-house microalgae laboratory.
It aims at creating microalgae biotech products with high added value. That is, the FEBICO products contain some rare nutrients or have particular functions. For example, Vegetable DHA from marine microalgae, Astaxanthin from Haematococcus Pluvialis mixed with Spirulina in capsule and immune diagnostic reagents, etc. Mr. C. C. Chiueh also threw out the idea of filtering pollutions such as endocrine disruptors by algae, viewing it a promising design that will solve environmental problems.

(3.) Production in commercial scale.
FEBICO has a 140,000 m² manufacturing site with over 60 microalgae culture ponds at southern Taiwan. With the patent of “Cracked Cell wall”, FEBICO can pop the thick cell wall of Chlorella like popcorn without producing heavy metal pollution. It allows up to 80% absorption rate, maintaining 100% nutrients in algae.

Mr. C. C. Chiueh showed his interest in DNA sequencing. Diminish concern about the genomic engineering.

(4.) Pigment(Link: Project-Pigment)
This is the most significant change after the meeting with Far East Bio-Tec Company(FEBICO). We learned the importance of additional value in algae. It inspired us to come up with another pathway ---Pigment---to increase the oil production in algae. With making pigment in algae, we expect that it can enhance the efficiency of photosynthesis, leading to the increase of oil production. Moreover, these pigments not only increase the efficiency of photosynthesis but also provide crucial nutrients, bringing benefits to our human bodies. For instance, Astaxanthin, which was mentioned in the meeting, has been included in our project. We are looking forward to presenting the spirit of adding value through the design of pigments in our project.

(5.) Device Improvement(Link: Project-Device)
By the discussion with Mr. C. C. Chiueh, we believe that using device can let us have the more accurate adjustment, measurement, and feedback. The large-scale cultivation in FEBICO also gives us a consideration on the problem about open pound cultivation.

On July 18th, 2017, to enhance our knowledge on microalgae and seek advice of our project, we visited Academia Sinica, a national academy that supports research in Taiwan. We contacted Professor Chu Hsiu-An, a professor with a Ph.D. in Biochemistry. He works at the Institute of Plant and microbial biology department. He provided us with a supply of Synechocystis species PCC6803 that can survive with its high dependence on glucose. He gave us further information on the optimal conditions for the cultivation of algae. We are really grateful that Dr. Chu was willing to provide us with the algae he uses in his lab. We later cultivated our algae in our own lab.Genomic DNA of PCC6803 was further extracted for the construction of NrtA gene.

You-Yin Chen is a professor of biomedical engineering a National Yang-Ming University. He is responsible for the integration of semiconductor process, micro-electromechanical technology, and material science, in order to develop a new generation of nerve wafers. Obviously, our device needs his brilliant skills and guidance. Luckily, he is willing to help us set up the initial architecture of the entire project as well as the erection of the network. Also, he provides us rich resources and technology, and guides us through the establishment of the whole program such as pH sensor, motor, circuit design…etc. Furthermore, he teaches us Arduino development version of the application and design. Most importantly, he suggests that we can use the cloud technology to store more data and keep records. Thanks to Professor Chen, we are able to improve our quality of the device.

After the 5th Asia-Pacific iGEM Conference, NYMU team had a chance to contact the primary instructor of NTHU team, Dr. Ya-Tang Yang, and his laboratory students. Dr. Yang is the associate professor of Institute of Electronics Engineering, National Tsing Hua University.They provided us with a set of Photo-Bioreactor made by themselves and taught us how to use the Photo-Bioreactor. During August to September, we discussed with Dr. Yang and his lab students, trying to fix some difficulties we encountered.
After the Photo-Bioreactor finally worked smoothly, we started to measure the OD value of microalgae we cultivated, collected huge amounts of data, and drew growth curves for our projects. Meanwhile, we shared collated data to Dr. Yang’s lab for research use. We believe this collaboration would be a great academic exchange and produce some interesting results.

On June 18, 2017, due to the lack of chemicals, NYMU-Taipei team contacted the Teaching Assistant of Department of Life Sciences and Institute of Genome Sciences, National Yang-Ming University, Mr. Nien Chung Yang, who manages the laboratory. Not only did he help us find the required chemicals such as iodine solution, and gradients of breeding medium, BG-11, but also provide us a working operation to prepare the breeding medium. Furthermore, Mr. Yang taught us how to work in experiment safely, and also gave us a lot of experimental advice on lab-working. Thanks to his generous support, we could progress our experiments more smoothly.