Difference between revisions of "Team:Sydney Australia/Description"

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<h2> Project Description </h2>
 
<h2> Project Description </h2>
  
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<p>Tell us about your project, describe what moves you and why this is something important for your team.</p>
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This year, the iGEM team from down under will be studying enzymes that are used for biocatalysis (green chemical synthesis) and bioremediation (biological degradation of pollutants). We are trying to develop fast growing strains of the bacterium Escherichia coli that can synthesise epoxides from alkenes. Epoxides are versatile intermediates, and are used in the manufacture of hundreds of products, including bulk chemicals like antifreeze (ethylene glycol) and fine chemicals like antiviral drugs (e.g. indinavir). Current methods of epoxide synthesis involve the use of hazardous and non-renewable reagents and are often characterised with low yields, specificity and purity. Enzymes offer a better alternative.  
  
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<h5>What should this page contain?</h5>
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The epoxidation reaction is performed by an  alkene monooxygenase enzyme that to date has only been found in ''Mycobacterium''. Mycobacterium is difficult to work with on an industrial scale, and thus we aim to express the alkene monooxygenase from Mycobacterium in Escherichia coli using recombinant DNA methods; this will generate a biocatalyst that is easy to work with, has a rapid growth rate, and gives higher levels of monooxygenase expression, and higher epoxide yields.  
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<li> A clear and concise description of your project.</li>
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<li>A detailed explanation of why your team chose to work on this particular project.</li>
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<li>References and sources to document your research.</li>
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<li>Use illustrations and other visual resources to explain your project.</li>
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This importance of this research is that as monooxygenase catalysts are renewable, non-toxic, biodegradable, and their activities can easily be scaled up for large-scale syntheses. A special feature of the alkene monooxygenase enzyme is that it produces highly enantiomerically-enriched epoxides (predominantly one optimal isomer) – this trait is crucial for the manufacture of bioactives such as pharmaceuticals. This project has the potential to re-design the manufacturing methods for many commonly used chemicals, replacing existing processes with more effective and ‘greener’ alternatives.
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<h4>Advice on writing your Project Description</h4>
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We encourage you to put up a lot of information and content on your wiki, but we also encourage you to include summaries as much as possible. If you think of the sections in your project description as the sections in a publication, you should try to be consist, accurate and unambiguous in your achievements.  
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Judges like to read your wiki and know exactly what you have achieved. This is how you should think about these sections; from the point of view of the judge evaluating you at the end of the year.
 
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<h4>References</h4>
 
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<p>iGEM teams are encouraged to record references you use during the course of your research. They should be posted somewhere on your wiki so that judges and other visitors can see how you though about your project and what works inspired you.</p>
 
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<h4>Inspiration</h4>
 
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<p>See how other teams have described and presented their projects: </p>
 
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<li><a href="https://2014.igem.org/Team:Imperial/Project"> Imperial</a></li>
 
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<li><a href="https://2014.igem.org/Team:UC_Davis/Project_Overview"> UC Davis</a></li>
 
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<li><a href="https://2014.igem.org/Team:SYSU-Software/Overview">SYSU Software</a></li>
 
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Revision as of 05:52, 16 July 2015



Project Description

This year, the iGEM team from down under will be studying enzymes that are used for biocatalysis (green chemical synthesis) and bioremediation (biological degradation of pollutants). We are trying to develop fast growing strains of the bacterium Escherichia coli that can synthesise epoxides from alkenes. Epoxides are versatile intermediates, and are used in the manufacture of hundreds of products, including bulk chemicals like antifreeze (ethylene glycol) and fine chemicals like antiviral drugs (e.g. indinavir). Current methods of epoxide synthesis involve the use of hazardous and non-renewable reagents and are often characterised with low yields, specificity and purity. Enzymes offer a better alternative. The epoxidation reaction is performed by an alkene monooxygenase enzyme that to date has only been found in ''Mycobacterium''. Mycobacterium is difficult to work with on an industrial scale, and thus we aim to express the alkene monooxygenase from Mycobacterium in Escherichia coli using recombinant DNA methods; this will generate a biocatalyst that is easy to work with, has a rapid growth rate, and gives higher levels of monooxygenase expression, and higher epoxide yields. This importance of this research is that as monooxygenase catalysts are renewable, non-toxic, biodegradable, and their activities can easily be scaled up for large-scale syntheses. A special feature of the alkene monooxygenase enzyme is that it produces highly enantiomerically-enriched epoxides (predominantly one optimal isomer) – this trait is crucial for the manufacture of bioactives such as pharmaceuticals. This project has the potential to re-design the manufacturing methods for many commonly used chemicals, replacing existing processes with more effective and ‘greener’ alternatives.