Team:BNDS China/Implementation

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Proposed implementation Rhamnolipid is a biosurfactant that has exceptional chemical and biological properties produced by microorganisms . As a non-toxic and biodegradable material, rhamnolipid has numerous applications in people’s daily lives, including the petroleum sector, the food industry, and the medical area.Since the existing rhamnolipid synthesis mechanism in P. aeruginosa cannot fulfill the high demand, our project plan to improve the rhamnolipid production pathway in E. coli using genetic engineering, and reapplied the new pathway back to P. aeruginosa. 1. Oil industries2. Farmers3. Bakeries Identification of end-users As our project can be defined as “a modified metabolic pathway for rhamnolipids synthesis using directed evolution”, the end-users of our project can be classified as the following three parts: Figure 1. oil industry factories and crude oil extraction In the oiling industry, rhamnolipid works as a surfactant, lowering the interfacial tension of oil and water. After compounding, the oil-displacing agent’s oil-water interfacial tension can reach 10-3mN/m (Jirui et al., 2002), enhancing oil displacement efficiency. High-yield and high-efficiency rhamnolipid synthesis may successfully filter and extract crude oil at low prices if the oil extraction industry implements our technology across the whole production chain. In this project, our human practice cooperated with Sinopec Group. Among them, Sinopec Group provided us with a strain of P. aeruginosa for us to perform gene editing, and we will send our optimized new P. aeruginosa back to Sinopec Group for practical application testing, which can effectively reflect our integration of the project with real life. More details can be found in the Human Practice page. Overview Envisioning the implementation In the food manufacturing industry, the use of rhamnolipids to improve the stability of dough and the volume of baked products has played a significant role. Bakeries can use rhamnolipid as a bulking agent to increase the baking volume, which can make the texture of the bread softer and fluffy, as well the taste. For baked products, increased dough stability means improved shockresistance, which is important for the process of using machines to make bread. Rhamnolipids can be applied on crops, vegetables, and fruits to promote growth and aid in nutrient absorption, with no adverse effects on humans or animals. Rhamnolipids could be used as a humectant in foliar fertilizers in the future. Instead of the hydrophobic waxy layer, their hydrophilic bases can extend into the fertilizer solution to form a directed adsorption membrane, maximizing the nutrients of the fertilizer absorbed and utilized. Furthermore, it has the potential to improve the alkaline soil environment. Rhamnolipid is an excellent addition for alkaline soil improvement. After all, under alkaline conditions, Rh can ionize Rh- and H+ and interact with OH- in alkaline soil to neutralize and improve its alkalinity. Safety Concern In terms of the safety and prospective applications of the compounds, all of our goods should be thoroughly sterilized and purified to remove endotoxin before leaving our laboratory. Furthermore, in our project, because P. eruginosa is used as a Biosafety Level 2 organism, all laboratory operations related with P. eruginosa should be performed in the Biosafety Level 2 cabin, which means there will be no biocontainment issues. Figure 3. rhamnolipid pathway in P. aeruginosa (Chatterjee, 2020) 1. Hou, Jirui, Yue, Xiang’an, Zhang, Shufen, and Jinzong Yang. “Restudy of Main Factors of Effects on ASP Flood and Expansion of Capillary Theory in Heterogeneous Reservoirs.” Paper presented at the SPE Asia Pacific Oil and Gas Conference and Exhibition, Melbourne, Australia, October 2002. doi: https://doi.org/10.2118/77800-MS2. Chatterjee, Paulami & Sass, Gabriele & Swietnicki, Wieslaw & Stevens, David. (2020). Review of Potential Pseudomonas Weaponry, Relevant to the Pseudomonas–Aspergillus Interplay, for the Mycology Community. Journal of Fungi. 6. 81. 10.3390/jof6020081. Reference
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