Team:UTArlingtonTexasUSA/Improve
IMPROVEMENT ON A PREVIOUS PROJECT
The Goal:
As mentioned on our Description Page, the different uses and methods of MFCs as bio-sensing modalities has been successfully proposed and developed in previous competitions. Our research group was inspired by the 2007 Glasgow team’s prediction of pyocyanin to power an E- coli based MFC. The reduction-oxidation of pyocyanin, a zwitterion, can be harnessed by the cells to indirectly deposit electrons on the anode electrode of the MFC; If the cells were to respond to a pollutant by producing pyocyanin, we can observe the change in current as an indication of the presence of the pollutant. Our team aims to investigate this sensing system by making the bacteria produce fluorescent proteins in response to the presence of xylene, a BTEX member pollutant, and utilizing this colorimetric change to correlate concentrations.
Our project will expand on Glasgow’s project by forcing the cells to produce fluorescent proteins in the presence of BTEX pollutant while simultaneously producing pyocyanin in order to deposit electrons onto the anode. By using this method, we can calibrate the MFC while detecting the pollutants ensuring the genes work. The substrate concentration under certain conditions has an impact on the formation and activity of biofilms, resulting in current densities proportional to the concentration of pollutants. Furthermore, we selected xylene as our toxin of choice because single substrate monitoring is superior to combined pollutant detection, showing excellent selectivity and sensitivity. Therefore, the implementation of MFC as specific substrate biosensor presents an obvious advantage and provides a novel aspect of MFC application. Construct genetically engineered bacteria with the ability to reflect the concentration of a given substrate into a voltage output in an MFC biosensor.
Check out Glasgow's 2007 Modeling Page to see where we derived our project inspiration from.
