CAREER: Engineering crop plants to metabolize products of CO2 electrolysis to enable food production with artificial photosynthesis

植物捕捉阳光并进行光合作用以推动植物生长。生物光合作用的能量效率非常低。因此，需要大面积的粮食种植。人工光合作用比自然光合作用更节能，但从未被用于粮食生产。该项目旨在开发植物和人工光合作用系统(APS)之间的接口。一旦接口被开发出来，植物将被设计成利用APS增强来更有效地生长。这项研究将与教育和外联活动相结合。这些措施将包括让本科生参与专注于二氧化碳电解的实验，并创建和运营一个“创业设计竞赛”，以鼓励学生将研究成果转化为创业目标。人工光合作用有可能比生物光合作用更节能，但尚未应用于食品生产。最近开发了一种用于节能食品生产的无机-生物混合人工光合作用系统。在一个两步的过程中，二氧化碳电解将二氧化碳转化为醋酸盐，醋酸盐为在黑暗中生长的食物有机体(藻类、酵母和蘑菇)提供碳和能源。将该系统与商业光伏相结合，为藻类的生长提供了约4%的太阳能到生物质能的转换效率。目前还不能以二氧化碳电解废水作为唯一的碳和能源来源来种植农作物。在二氧化碳电解废液中发现的短链羧酸、醇和醛的植物代谢方面存在许多知识空白。该项目的目标是发现植物如何代谢二氧化碳电解的产物，并设计植物新陈代谢以更好地利用这些产物作为碳和能源的异养来源。为了实现这些目标，该项目有两个主要目标：(1)设计具有更好的醋酸盐耐受性和利用率的植物；(2)发现植物如何耐受和代谢二氧化碳电解液的其他产品。该项目由ENG/CBET中的细胞和生化工程(CBE)计划以及BIO/MCB中的系统和合成生物学(SSB)计划联合支持。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Plants capture sunlight and perform photosynthesis to drive plant growth. Biological photosynthesis is very energy inefficient. Therefore, large areas are required for food cultivation. Artificial photosynthesis is more energy efficient than natural photosynthesis but has never been used for food production. This project seeks to develop an interface between plants and artificial photosynthesis systems (APS). Once the interface has been developed, plants will be engineered to grow more efficiently utilizing APS augmentation. The research will be integrated with educational and outreach activities. These will include engaging undergraduates in labs focused on CO2 electrolysis and creating and running a ‘Startup Design Competition’ to encourage students to translate research results into entrepreneurial pursuits.Artificial photosynthesis has the potential to be much more energy efficient than biological photosynthesis but has not yet been applied to food production. A hybrid inorganic–biological artificial photosynthesis system for energy-efficient food production was recently developed. In a two-step process, CO2 electrolysis converts CO2 into acetate, which serves as a carbon and energy source for food producing organisms (algae, yeast, and mushrooms) grown in the dark. Coupling this system to commercial photovoltaics gives a solar energy-to-biomass energy conversion efficiency of ~4% for the growth of algae. Crop plants cannot currently be cultivated with CO2 electrolysis effluent as their sole carbon and energy source. Many knowledge gaps exist about plant metabolism of short chain carboxylic acids, alcohols, and aldehydes found in CO2 electrolysis effluent. The goals of this project are to discover how plants metabolize products of CO2 electrolysis and to engineer plant metabolism to better use these products as heterotrophic sources of carbon and energy. To achieve these goals the project has two main objectives: (1) engineer plants with improved acetate tolerance and utilization; and (2) discover how plants tolerate and metabolize other products of CO2 electrolysis.This project is being jointly supported by the Cellular and Biochemical Engineering (CBE) Program in ENG/CBET and by the Systems and Synthetic Biology (SSB) Program in BIO/MCB.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.