Scientific outlook
In our project, we were able to show that E. coli is able to grow on methanol and to produce glycogen. The implementation of methanol into the metabolism can be improved by building the monocystronic diversity library. Combinations of promoters with different strengths could be tested and thus the optimal metabolic flux is to be found.
We want our glycogen to be used for various processes and different industries. Therefore, we need a reliable glycogen purification method to provide our universal carbon source.
Finally, we could show that the combined strain of our methanol operon and the knockout of one degradation enzyme (glgP) is able to grow. Further characterization of the metabolic flux is important to scale-up the process.
Possible future in 50 year:
The energy price kept dropping and renewable energy became more efficient and available.
Most of the fuels are sustainably produced by technical conversion to hydrocarbons, which are available in huge amounts.
The biotechnology and starch based industry is based on a variety of substrates, mainly wastes and glycogen produced from methanol.
The arable land that was previously used to grow energy crops is now renatured or used for food crops. The renaturing of area that was a former part of the bioeconomy, now binds a large amount of CO2 from the atmosphere which brought climate change to a halt.
With the left over arable land and improved agriculture, we can guarantee food security without an extensive use of fertilizers. The decreased use of fertilizers reduced the pollution of rivers and oceans which led to a more stable environment.