scholarly journals Recent Molecular Tools for the Genetic Manipulation of Highly Industrially Important Mucoromycota Fungi

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (12) ◽  
pp. 1061
Author(s):  
Hassan Mohamed ◽  
Tahira Naz ◽  
Junhuan Yang ◽  
Aabid Manzoor Shah ◽  
Yusuf Nazir ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Genetic Manipulation ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Industrial Applications ◽  
Fungal Species ◽  
Model Organisms ◽  
Molecular Tools ◽  
Genetic Tools ◽  
Efficient Gene ◽  
Genetic Modifications

Mucorales is the largest and most well-studied order of the phylum Mucormycota and is known for its rapid growth rate and various industrial applications. The Mucorales fungi are a fascinating group of filamentous organisms with many uses in research and the industrial and medical fields. They are widely used biotechnological producers of various secondary metabolites and other value-added products. Certain members of Mucorales are extensively used as model organisms for genetic and molecular investigation and have extended our understanding of the metabolisms of other members of this order as well. Compared with other fungal species, our understanding of Mucoralean fungi is still in its infancy, which could be linked to their lack of effective genetic tools. However, recent advancements in molecular tools and approaches, such as the construction of recyclable markers, silencing vectors, and the CRISPR-Cas9-based gene-editing system, have helped us to modify the genomes of these model organisms. Multiple genetic modifications have been shown to generate valuable products on a large scale and helped us to understand the morphogenesis, basic biology, pathogenesis, and host–pathogen interactions of Mucoralean fungi. In this review, we discuss various conventional and modern genetic tools and approaches used for efficient gene modification in industrially important members of Mucorales.

scholarly journals High-Throughput Platform for Efficient Chemical Transfection, Virus Packaging, and Transduction

Micromachines ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (6) ◽  
pp. 387
Author(s):  
Jianxiong Zhang ◽  
Yawei Hu ◽  
Xiaoqing Wang ◽  
Peng Liu ◽  
Xiaofang Chen
Keyword(s):  
Gene Delivery ◽  
High Throughput ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Cell Types ◽  
Long Term Storage ◽  
Efficient Gene ◽  
Genetic Modifications ◽  
Media Change ◽  
Virus Packaging ◽  
Nih 3T3

Intracellular gene delivery is normally required to study gene functions. A versatile platform able to perform both chemical transfection and viral transduction to achieve efficient gene modification in most cell types is needed. Here we demonstrated that high throughput chemical transfection, virus packaging, and transduction can be conducted efficiently on our previously developed superhydrophobic microwell array chip (SMAR-chip). A total of 169 chemical transfections were successfully performed on the chip in physically separated microwells through a few simple steps, contributing to the convenience of DNA delivery and media change on the SMAR-chip. Efficiencies comparable to the traditional transfection in multi-well plates (~65%) were achieved while the manual operations were largely reduced. Two transfection procedures, the dry method amenable for the long term storage of the transfection material and the wet method for higher efficiencies were developed. Multiple transfections in a scheduled manner were performed to further increase the transfection efficiencies or deliver multiple genes at different time points. In addition, high throughput virus packaging integrated with target cell transduction were also proved which resulted in a transgene expression efficiency of >70% in NIH 3T3 cells. In summary, the SMAR-chip based high throughput gene delivery is efficient and versatile, which can be used for large scale genetic modifications in a variety of cell types.

scholarly journals Applications of Bacillus subtilis Spores in Biotechnology and Advanced Materials

2020 ◽  
Vol 86 (17) ◽  
Author(s):  
Xiaopei Zhang ◽  
Amal Al-Dossary ◽  
Myer Hussain ◽  
Peter Setlow ◽  
Jiahe Li
Keyword(s):  
Bacillus Subtilis ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Genetic Manipulation ◽  
Industrial Applications ◽  
Advanced Materials ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Interdisciplinary Approaches ◽  
Food Shortages ◽  
Material Sciences ◽  
Basic Studies

ABSTRACT The bacterium Bacillus subtilis has long been an important subject for basic studies. However, this organism has also had industrial applications due to its easy genetic manipulation, favorable culturing characteristics for large‐scale fermentation, superior capacity for protein secretion, and generally recognized as safe (GRAS) status. In addition, as the metabolically dormant form of B. subtilis, its spores have attracted great interest due to their extreme resistance to many environmental stresses, which makes spores a novel platform for a variety of applications. In this review, we summarize both conventional and emerging applications of B. subtilis spores, with a focus on how their unique characteristics have led to innovative applications in many areas of technology, including generation of stable and recyclable enzymes, synthetic biology, drug delivery, and material sciences. Ultimately, this review hopes to inspire the scientific community to leverage interdisciplinary approaches using spores to address global concerns about food shortages, environmental protection, and health care.

scholarly journals Biotechnological Valorization of Pectinolytics and Their Industrial Applications: A Review

2014 ◽  
Vol 9 (11) ◽  
pp. 1934578X1400901 ◽  
Author(s):  
Muhammad Irshad ◽  
Muhammad Asgher ◽  
Zahid Anwar ◽  
Aftab Ahmad
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Industrial Applications ◽  
Green Biotechnology ◽  
A Value ◽  
Physico Chemical ◽  
Target Yield ◽  
High Yields ◽  
Agricultural Materials

In the last several years, in serious consideration of the worldwide economic and environmental issues there has been an increasing research interest in the value of naturally occurring bio-sourced materials. Agro-industrial based biomass comprised of pectin is an inexpensive, renewable, abundant natural resource that could be utilized for large-scale and cost-effective production of natural products i.e., pectinolytics. Pectinolytics are one of the most widely distributed enzymes in bacteria, fungi and plants. From ancient times to date, many methods have been introduced to improve the optimization of pectinolytics to obtain high yields of maximal purity. To expand the range of natural bio-resources the rapidly evolving tools of biotechnology can lower the conversion costs and also enhance target yield of the product of interest. This green biotechnology presents a promising approach to convert most of the agricultural materials into a value-added product with multiple applications. Major advances have already been achieved in recent years in order to obtain high levels of purity with optimal yields. The present review begins with an overview of pectinolytics and their physico-chemical features, and their specific role with classification based on pectic materials. Information is also given on the culture influences and potential sources of pectinolytics, followed by a brief summary of various industrial and biotechnological applications and future considerations.

scholarly journals Purification and characterisation of thermostable α-amylases from microbial sources

BioResources ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 2005-2029
Author(s):  
Si J. Lim ◽  
Siti Nur Hazwani-Oslan ◽  
Siti N. Oslan
Keyword(s):  
Column Chromatography ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Genetic Manipulation ◽  
Promising Result ◽  
Potato Starch ◽  
Industrial Applications ◽  
Wheat Starch ◽  
Starch Degradation ◽  
Affinity Column ◽  
Microbial Sources

α-Amylases (E.C 3.2.1.1) hydrolyse starch into smaller moieties such as maltose and glucose by breaking α-1,4-glycosidic linkages. The application of α-amylases in various industries has made the large-scale productions of these enzymes crucial. Thermostable α-amylase that catalyses starch degradation at the temperatures higher than 50 °C is favourable in harsh industrial applications. Due to ease in genetic manipulation and bulk production, this enzyme is most preferably produced by microorganisms. Bacillus sp. and Escherichia coli are commonly used microbial expression hosts for α-amylases (30 to 205 kDa in molecular weight). These amylases can be purified using ultrafiltration, salt precipitation, dialysis, and column chromatography. Recently, affinity column chromatography has shown the most promising result where the recovery rate was 38 to 60% and purification up to 13.2-fold. Microbial thermostable α-amylases have the optimum temperature and pH ranging from 50 °C to 100 °C and 5.0 to 10.5, respectively. These enzymes have high specificity towards potato starch, wheat starch, amylose, and amylopectin. EDTA (1 mM) gave the highest inhibitory effect (79%), but Ca2+ (5 mM) was the most effective co-factor with 155%. This review provides insight regarding thermostable α-amylases obtained from microbial sources for industrial applications.

scholarly journals Multi-Country Scale Assessment of Available Energy Recovery Potential Using Micro-Hydropower in Drinking, Pressurised Irrigation and Wastewater Networks, Covering Part of the EU

Water ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 899
Author(s):  
Djordje Mitrovic ◽  
Miguel Crespo Chacón ◽  
Aida Mérida García ◽  
Jorge García Morillo ◽  
Juan Antonio Rodríguez Diaz ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Drinking Water ◽  
Northern Ireland ◽  
Energy Recovery ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Significant Proportion ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Net Energy ◽  
Water Networks ◽  
Scale Assessment

Studies have shown micro-hydropower (MHP) opportunities for energy recovery and CO2 reductions in the water sector. This paper conducts a large-scale assessment of this potential using a dataset amassed across six EU countries (Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Spain, and Portugal) for the drinking water, irrigation, and wastewater sectors. Extrapolating the collected data, the total annual MHP potential was estimated between 482.3 and 821.6 GWh, depending on the assumptions, divided among Ireland (15.5–32.2 GWh), Scotland (17.8–139.7 GWh), Northern Ireland (5.9–8.2 GWh), Wales (10.2–8.1 GWh), Spain (375.3–539.9 GWh), and Portugal (57.6–93.5 GWh) and distributed across the drinking water (43–67%), irrigation (51–30%), and wastewater (6–3%) sectors. The findings demonstrated reductions in energy consumption in water networks between 1.7 and 13.0%. Forty-five percent of the energy estimated from the analysed sites was associated with just 3% of their number, having a power output capacity >15 kW. This demonstrated that a significant proportion of energy could be exploited at a small number of sites, with a valuable contribution to net energy efficiency gains and CO2 emission reductions. This also demonstrates cost-effective, value-added, multi-country benefits to policy makers, establishing the case to incentivise MHP in water networks to help achieve the desired CO2 emissions reductions targets.

scholarly journals Effects of a Twin-Screw Extruder Equipped with a Molten Resin Reservoir on the Mechanical Properties and Microstructure of Recycled Waste Plastic Polyethylene Pellet Moldings

Polymers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 1058
Author(s):  
Hikaru Okubo ◽  
Haruka Kaneyasu ◽  
Tetsuya Kimura ◽  
Patchiya Phanthong ◽  
Shigeru Yao
Keyword(s):  
Mechanical Properties ◽  
Mechanical Performance ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Industrial Applications ◽  
Twin Screw Extruder ◽  
Screw Extruder ◽  
Polymer Properties ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Twin Screw ◽  
Recycled Plastics

Each year, increasing amounts of plastic waste are generated, causing environmental pollution and resource loss. Recycling is a solution, but recycled plastics often have inferior mechanical properties to virgin plastics. However, studies have shown that holding polymers in the melt state before extrusion can restore the mechanical properties; thus, we propose a twin-screw extruder with a molten resin reservoir (MSR), a cavity between the screw zone and twin-screw extruder discharge, which retains molten polymer after mixing in the twin-screw zone, thus influencing the polymer properties. Re-extruded recycled polyethylene (RPE) pellets were produced, and the tensile properties and microstructure of virgin polyethylene (PE), unextruded RPE, and re-extruded RPE moldings prepared with and without the MSR were evaluated. Crucially, the elongation at break of the MSR-extruded RPE molding was seven times higher than that of the original RPE molding, and the Young’s modulus of the MSR-extruded RPE molding was comparable to that of the virgin PE molding. Both the MSR-extruded RPE and virgin PE moldings contained similar striped lamellae. Thus, MSR re-extrusion improved the mechanical performance of recycled polymers by optimizing the microstructure. The use of MSRs will facilitate the reuse of waste plastics as value-added materials having a wide range of industrial applications.

scholarly journals Environmental RNAi pathways in the two-spotted spider mite

BMC Genomics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mosharrof Mondal ◽  
Jacob Peter ◽  
Obrie Scarbrough ◽  
Alex Flynt
Keyword(s):  
Gene Expression ◽  
Small Rna ◽  
Spider Mite ◽  
Genetic Manipulation ◽  
Model Organisms ◽  
Rnai Pathway ◽  
Plant Host ◽  
Rnai Technology ◽  
Two Spotted Spider Mite ◽  
Multicellular Organisms

Abstract Background RNA interference (RNAi) regulates gene expression in most multicellular organisms through binding of small RNA effectors to target transcripts. Exploiting this process is a popular strategy for genetic manipulation and has applications that includes arthropod pest control. RNAi technologies are dependent on delivery method with the most convenient likely being feeding, which is effective in some animals while others are insensitive. The two-spotted spider mite, Tetranychus urticae, is prime candidate for developing RNAi approaches due to frequent occurrence of conventional pesticide resistance. Using a sequencing-based approach, the fate of ingested RNAs was explored to identify features and conditions that affect small RNA biogenesis from external sources to better inform RNAi design. Results Biochemical and sequencing approaches in conjunction with extensive computational assessment were used to evaluate metabolism of ingested RNAs in T. urticae. This chelicerae arthropod shows only modest response to oral RNAi and has biogenesis pathways distinct from model organisms. Processing of synthetic and plant host RNAs ingested during feeding were evaluated to identify active substrates for spider mite RNAi pathways. Through cataloging characteristics of biochemically purified RNA from these sources, trans-acting small RNAs could be distinguished from degradation fragments and their origins documented. Conclusions Using a strategy that delineates small RNA processing, we found many transcripts have the potential to enter spider mite RNAi pathways, however, trans-acting RNAs appear very unstable and rare. This suggests potential RNAi pathway substrates from ingested materials are mostly degraded and infrequently converted into regulators of gene expression. Spider mites infest a variety of plants, and it would be maladaptive to generate diverse gene regulators from dietary RNAs. This study provides a framework for assessing RNAi technology in organisms where genetic and biochemical tools are absent and benefit rationale design of RNAi triggers for T.urticae.

scholarly journals Time-resolved PIV measurements of a deflected submerged jet interacting with liquid-gas and liquid-liquid interfaces

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Puttinger ◽  
Mahdi Saeedipour
Keyword(s):  
Liquid Layer ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Free Surface Flow ◽  
Industrial Applications ◽  
Liquid Pool ◽  
Surface Flow ◽  
Two Phase ◽  
Time Resolved ◽  
Submerged Jet ◽  
Major Interest

AbstractThis paper presents an experimental investigation on the interactions of a deflected submerged jet into a liquid pool with its above interface in the absence and presence of an additional lighter liquid. Whereas the former is a free surface flow, the latter mimics a situation of two stratified liquids where the liquid-liquid interface is disturbed by large-scale motions in the liquid pool. Such configurations are encountered in various industrial applications and, in most cases, it is of major interest to avoid the entrainment of droplets from the lighter liquid into the main flow. Therefore, it is important to understand the fluid dynamics in such configurations and to analyze the differences between the cases with and without the additional liquid layer. To study this problem, we applied time-resolved particle image velocimetry experiments with high spatial resolution. A detailed data analysis of a small layer beneath the interface shows that although the presence of an additional liquid layer stabilizes the oscillations of the submerged jet significantly, the amount of kinetic energy, enstrophy, and velocity fluctuations concentrated in the proximity of the interface is higher when the oil layer is present. In addition, we analyze the energy distribution across the eigenmodes of a proper orthogonal distribution and the distribution of strain and vortex dominated regions. As the main objective of this study, these high-resolution time-resolved experimental data provide a validation platform for the development of new models in the context of the volume of fluid-based large eddy simulation of turbulent two-phase flows.

Research on a New Type of Lithium Battery String Equalization and Management System

2011 ◽  
Vol 383-390 ◽  
pp. 1470-1476
Author(s):  
Hao Wang ◽  
Ding Guo Shao ◽  
Lu Xu
Keyword(s):  
Lithium Batteries ◽  
Management System ◽  
Lithium Battery ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Control Method ◽  
Balance Control ◽  
Industrial Applications ◽  
Control Technique ◽  
New Type ◽  
Management Functions

Lithium battery has been employed widely in many industrial applications. Parameter mismatches between lithium batteries along a series string is the critical limits of the large-scale applications in high power situation. Maintaining equalization between batteries is the key technique in lithium batteries application. This paper summarizes normal equalization techniques and proposed a new type of lithium Battery Equalization and Management System (BEMS) employing the isolated DC-DC converter structure. The system is integrated both equalization functions and management functions by using distributed 3-level controlled structure and digital control technique. With this control method the flexibility of the balance control strategy and the compatibility for different battery strings are both improved dramatically. The experimental results show optimizing equalization, efficiency and the battery string life span has been extended.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document