Team:Beijing United/Description

Description

I. Background

Inspiration

In modern days, alcohol has become a very critical element in our daily life. When we think of alcohol, we usually think of the wines, beer and other alcoholic drinks. However, there are much more than that. In fact, alcohol is present in medical disinfectants, clothing dye, fuel energy, cosmetics, and many other common products. Recently, the demands for alcohol products, especially medical alcohol products, has increased a considerable amount due to COVID-19. That brings the problem of rising the market price of alcohol products since the demand is higher, so not all people were able to afford the disinfectants and be protected against the virus. Therefore, our idea of the project is to find methods to lower the cost of producing alcohol, so the market prize could be lower, so more people can be saved under the pandemic of COVID-19.

General process of alcohol fermentation

In modern days, alcohol has become a very critical element in our daily life. When we think of alcohol, we usually think of the wines, beer and other alcoholic drinks. However, there are much more than that. In fact, alcohol is present in medical disinfectants, clothing dye, fuel energy, cosmetics, and many other common products. Recently, the demands for alcohol products, especially medical alcohol products, has increased a considerable amount due to COVID-19. That brings the problem of rising the market price of alcohol products since the demand is higher, so not all people were able to afford the disinfectants and be protected against the virus. Therefore, our idea of the project is to find methods to lower the cost of producing alcohol, so the market prize could be lower, so more people can be saved under the pandemic of COVID-19.

Another type of yeast is cultivated yeast, which will be artificially add into the ingredients to act as a kick-start for the process. They can come with different functions, size and functions. This makes the fermenting process much faster and easier for the producer to get the results that they expected. Therefore, this is usually the yeast that companies select since they will need to produce alcohol in large quantities.

Introduction of wheat B starch

As for the ingredient we choose for fermentation, we consider factors including environmental and economical benefits. The true ingredient we need for fermentation in starch is the glucose, but it will be too expensive to purchase as ingredients for companies that produce alcohol. However, glucose is a type of monosaccharides, which starch is the polymer of them, so it would be a suitable ingredient for producing alcohol. The reason we choose type B wheat starch is to prevent food waste. This is because type A wheat starch are the ones that we usually consume in baking goods, but type B will either be thrown away or made into fodder, which both did not maximize its value. When comparing with type A starch, the type B starch displays higher amount of crystallinity, lower gelatinization, and lower viscosity. Therefore, since it’s not the perfect ingredient for the current area it’s in, we are trying to find new use to it, to give this “waste” a new life.

Correlation between COVID-19 and Alcohol products

As COVID-19 broke out, the FDA has posted announcements about using hand sanitizer and alcoholic disinfection products. Within the report, the data has shown that there is a large increase in the demands of hand sanitizer products that contains ethanol, which is the ethyl alcohol. According to the FDA, hand hygiene s a very important element towards U.S.’s response to COVID-19. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and World Health Organization (WHO) also recommends citizens use “alcohol-based hand sanitizer than contains at least 60% alcohol. “Any kind of alcohol based sanitizer should be used, according to the FDA, after using bathroom, coughing, sneezing or blowing nose, and also before eating. This way it can protect the germs at its maximum level. Moreover, suggested by the CDC, carefully read the label when buying sanitizers, alcohol can also be referred as isopropanol, ethanol, ethyl alcohol, or 2-propanol.

II. General Concept

Figure 1 General concept of the experiments.

Our goal of the project is to alter yeast genes to increase alcohol production and reduce starch waste. The science behind the project is that we implant three different types of genes into the new type of yeast, so that it can produce three types of enzymes on its own, which the enzymes are critical to the process of brewing alcohol.

We implanted xylanase gene AnXlnB, β- Xylosidase gene AnXlnD and acetylxylan esterase gene CcXynA to plasmid respectively. The design of our strain is shown in Figure 1.

First of all, we will manipulate PCR and manipulate electrophoresis on the PCR samples that we have got. Therefore, we will obtain DNA fragments AnXlnB, AnXlnD, CcXynA and genes related to plasmid construction. After this, we will conduct enzyme digestion on genes and plasmid and ligate link AnXlnB, AnXlnD, CcXynA fragments respectively with plasmid pOdd-1, pOdd-2 and pOdd-3.

Next, we will transform these three plasmids into chemically competent cells, E. coli DH5α. After this step, a massive number of plasmids pXlnB, pXlnD and pXynA could be extracted from the bacteria. After this, we will conduct enzyme digestion on these plasmids and finally we will get three plasmid pXylan, pXylanB and pXylanBD. These three plasmids pXylan, pXylanB and pXylanBD will be transformed into yeast (WXA). Then, we will carry out DNS method to detect the fermentation performance.

III. Expected Result

Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains with the decomposition and utilization ability of pentosan could be obtained which possesses the good ability of fermentation to produce alcohol.

IV. Reference