A team led by the ΒιΆΉΣ°ΤΊ has been awarded $9.2 million over five years from the U.S. Department of Energy to research modifying E. coli to produce biofuels such as gasoline.
βThis is a fantastic opportunity to take what we have worked on for the past decade to the next level,β said team leader Ryan Gill, a fellow of CU-ΒιΆΉΣ°ΤΊβs Renewable and Sustainable Energy Institute, or RASEI. βIn this project, we will develop technologies that are orders of magnitude beyond where we are currently.β
The team is working with a non-pathogenic strain of E. coli. Among the microbeβs more than 4,000 genes, the team is searching for a small set and how it can be manipulated in a combination of on and off states to change the bacteriaβs behavior.Μύ
βE. coli is not going to want to make your biofuel at all,β said Gill, whoβs also a CU-ΒιΆΉΣ°ΤΊ associate professor of chemical and biological engineering. βIt doesnβt do that naturally. Itβs programmed with thousands of genes controlling how it replicates. Weβre figuring out what control structure we need to rewire in the bug to make it do what we want, not what it wants.β
Included in the team are Rob Knight, CU-ΒιΆΉΣ°ΤΊ associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry; Pin-Ching Maness, principal scientist at DOEβs National Renewable Energy Laboratory, or NREL; and Adam Arkin, physical biosciences director at DOEβs Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
The researchers hope to engineer the production of ethylene and isobutanol in the modified E. coli. The two compounds are widely used commodities that can be converted into gasoline among other chemicals.
The greatest challenge is harnessing an efficient and inexpensive process that competes with abundant and low-cost fossil fuels like oil, according to Gill.
βMicroorganisms and their genomes are incredibly complex machines,β said Gill. βThe first step alone -- of pinpointing the part of the E. coli genome that can help us make biofuels or other chemicals on a cost-competitive basis -- is a daunting challenge. Then we have to determine if the results we want will take one year or decades, $5 million or $500 million.β
The team will be able to simultaneously identify numerous E. coli genes and the results of turning these genes on or off using advanced technologies. Many of the technologies have been developed by the researchersβ own labs.
The grant is the first of its kind from the DOEβs Office of Biological and Environmental Research and was awarded to only seven other research groups including teams led by MIT, Purdue University and the J. Craig Venter Institute.
In 2011, CUβs Technology Transfer Office named Gill an inventor of the year. In 2005, Gill won a National Science Foundation CAREER Award as well as a National Institutes of Health K25 Career Development Award for genomics research and teaching.
For more information about the DOE grant and other awardees visit . For more information about RASEI visit .