Design
Here, we hope to develop an irreversible biological carbon fixed system through genetic engineering upon a kind of seaweed Synechococcus sp. PCC 7002, which would be used to fix carbon dioxide high efficiently in vast wild nature environment. To reach our goal, the algae should be genetically engineered in two directions. First it need to be transformed with some stronger or more efficiency carbon fixation genes like Rubisco or glucogen genes to improve CO2 capturing and conversion. And further it will express metal binding proteins on surface to promote the absorption of metal irons to increase the cell density. Through these modifications, the algae is designed to sink to sea bottom in the late growth stage with the carbon products together so as to reduce the carbon recycle.
Detail
Although it is a big and long-time project with lots of work to do and with great challenges, we have already moved forword with several critical and important steps in the past one year. These works can be divided into five major parts. The part 1 is about choosing a perfect algae from lots of candidates. In Part2 we mainly described the design and construction of expression vectors. In part3 we tested the metal binding using surface display in E.coli, which is a critical and fundamental work of ‘sinking alga’. And part 4 is about the transgenetic engineering of Synechococcus sp. PCC 7002. Finally we introduced a prototype of culture device designed by our team.
