Line 23: | Line 23: | ||
<h3>Microbial Fuel Cell with E. coli</h3> | <h3>Microbial Fuel Cell with E. coli</h3> | ||
− | <p>After discussing the ethical issues of using yeast with <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/ | + | <p>After discussing the ethical issues of using yeast with <a href="https://2016.igem.org/Team:Newcastle/HP/Gold">PEALS</a>, we decided to build novel genetic constructs for <i>E. coli</i>. However, we used the same protocol as above and made only slight changes, such as dissolving 1 g of arabinose as well as the 9 g of glucose into 50 ml of potassium phosphate buffer solution. 4 ml of the <a href="http://parts.igem.org/Part:BBa_K1895004">BBa_K1895004</a> and the <a href="http://parts.igem.org/Part:BBa_K1895005">BBa_K1895005</a> cell cultures were added to individual fuel cells during the experiments.</p> |
<p>The fuel cells were left to run for an hour and the voltage taken every 3 minutes.</p> | <p>The fuel cells were left to run for an hour and the voltage taken every 3 minutes.</p> |
Latest revision as of 02:16, 20 October 2016
Results: Microbial Fuel Cell
Microbial Fuel Cell with Yeast
Our original experiment, which used yeast as the electron transport agent, followed a modified version of the University of Reading’s protocol kindly given to us by Dr Ed Milner, Dr Paniz Izadi and Professor Ian Head. The modified protocol can be found here
These results show a steady voltage output of around 500mV over the hour. After carrying out this experiment, we started to move towards using E. coli instead. We modified the Reading Univeristy protocol in order to this, see below.
Microbial Fuel Cell with E. coli
After discussing the ethical issues of using yeast with PEALS, we decided to build novel genetic constructs for E. coli. However, we used the same protocol as above and made only slight changes, such as dissolving 1 g of arabinose as well as the 9 g of glucose into 50 ml of potassium phosphate buffer solution. 4 ml of the BBa_K1895004 and the BBa_K1895005 cell cultures were added to individual fuel cells during the experiments.
The fuel cells were left to run for an hour and the voltage taken every 3 minutes.
Conclusion
As evidenced by the given growth curves above, we can confirm that by placing the constructs under the pBAD arabinose-induced promoter, we can increase the overall growth of the battery constructs. Therefore we believe we have improved upon the part developed by Bielefeld 2013 who had reduced growth of E.coli containing their construct which had a constitutive T7 promoter. This may have been as a result of increased translation pressure.