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

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：

Department of Chemical Engineering in John Hopkins University

On July 16, 2017, thanks to the help of a senior NYMU-Taipei team participant, we contacted a Ph.D. student from Department of Chemical Engineering at John Hopkins University, Chien Ting Li. Through Skype webcam, we discussed our project with him, including experimental design, theoretical mechanism, and the follow-up application. Chien Ting also shared with us how academics and industries in the US view biomass energy, and how we can improve our co-culture system and simulation model. This exchange was inspirational and fruitful, and we really appreciated that Chien Ting pointed out what we missed in the process of brainstorming.

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?

Academia Sinica

Academia Sinica On July 18th, 2017, to enhance our knowledge on microalgae 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 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.

Professor Chen

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.

Professor Yang

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, Dr. 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, Dr. 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.

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-				  We reached out and contacted Far East Bio-Tec. Co., Ltd for some more insights for our project. The Far East Bio-Tec company is the largest microalgae supplier in Asia. Having a 140,000 m2 manufacturing site with over 60 microalgae ponds, we believe that FEBICO would give us more suggestions on our algae cultivation process in our labs. We were honored that the President of FEBICO himself, C. C. Chiuh, spoke with us for around 2 hours. We presented the concepts of synthetic biology, explained about the components that constituted the iGEM competition and an outline of our project to Mr. C. C.Chiueh. Mr. C. C Chieuh believes that much more research effort should be put into microalgae and was glad that we get the opportunity to raise awareness of the advantages of microalgae in Boston. During our meeting, he points out the advantages of microalgae. He stresses how microalgae can benefit humankind either through eating it to purify our bodies or used to produce biofuel. In terms of our project, he reminded us of the low cost of oil and suggested alternative uses of algae like its ability to remove pollutant in wastewater. We took his recommendation into consideration and we believe that this meeting was extremely meaningful as it put our project in terms of a business company’s perspective. Furthermore, Mr. C. C. Chieuh told us that <i>Chlorella vulgaris</i> cultivates more oil compared to that of other microalgae. </p>
+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：
+</p>
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 <img src="https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2017/9/98/NYMU-_Far_East_Bio_Tec_photo.png" width="400px"  height="300px" />
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 <h4>	 Department of Chemical Engineering in John Hopkins University</h4>
                                 <p>      On July 16, 2017, thanks to the help of a senior NYMU-Taipei team participant, we contacted a Ph.D. student from Department of Chemical Engineering at John Hopkins University, Chien Ting Li. Through Skype webcam, we discussed our project with him, including experimental design, theoretical mechanism, and the follow-up application. Chien Ting also shared with us how academics and industries in the US view biomass energy, and how we can improve our co-culture system and simulation model. This exchange was inspirational and fruitful, and we really appreciated that Chien Ting pointed out what we missed in the process of brainstorming.</p>
+                                <l>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?</l>