IDBR: Microscale Continuous Culture Bioreactor Array

该奖项旨在开发一种基于聚合物微芯片的仪器，用于并行进行多个微型连续培养实验。 该仪器将用于微生物生理学、遗传学、生态学和生物技术的微生物生长动力学研究。虽然研究一直专注于从基因组水平了解这些生长动力学，但从遗传分析到批量培养生长实验的准确验证仍然存在很大困难。分批培养对于表征细胞过程并不理想，因为细胞不断地受到难以分析的环境变化的影响。 在连续培养中，通过控制环境条件并提供来自生长容器的营养物的稳定流入和培养液的流出来将对数期培养维持在稳定状态。 用于连续培养实验的恒化器可以在数周内保持一致的生长条件，消除可能掩盖微小变化的二次生长效应，并允许在生长动力学实验中获得可靠和可重复的数据。 在如此长的时间尺度下，诸如培养基的成本、在培养基添加期间保持无菌性以及必要的实验数量等因素变得越来越重要。 本项目的目的是开发一种专门设计用于进行微型平行连续培养的系统，该系统既简单又便宜，可以在大学实验室使用，同时又提供足够的精度、数据质量和控制能力，可以在研究实验室进行研究。这是一个开发用于细胞生长研究的塑料微芯片的项目，该芯片具有比一滴水小的可控微环境。这些微型生命支持系统为细胞提供氧气，中和它们的废物，并确保细胞营养充足。 其目标是开发足够便宜的微芯片，供本科实验室和研究使用。微芯片将在本科生实验室进行测试，为本科生课程的本科生研究项目开发模块。

This award is for developing a polymer-microchip-based instrument for multiple microscale continuous culture experiments in parallel. The instrument will be used for research on microbial growth kinetics for microbial physiology, genetics, ecology and biotechnology. While research has been focusing on understanding these growth kinetics from a genomic level, there is still great difficulty in making the leap from genetic analysis to accurate verification with batch culture growth experiments. Batch cultures are not ideal for characterizing cellular processes, because cells are constantly subjected to environmental changes that are difficult to analyze. In continuous culture, log-phase culture is maintained in steady state by controlling the environmental conditions and providing a steady inflow of nutrients and an outflow of culture broth from the growth vessel. A chemostat, for continuous culture experiments, can maintain consistent growth conditions for weeks, eliminating secondary growth effects that can overshadow small changes and allowing for reliable and reproducible data necessary in growth kinetics experiments. Under such long time scales, factors such as the cost of medium, maintaining sterility during medium addition, and number of experiments necessary become increasingly important. The objective of this project is to develop a system specifically designed for performing microscale parallel continuous cultures that is simple and inexpensive enough to be used in undergraduate laboratories, while providing the precision, data quality, and control capability sufficient for investigation in research laboratories.This is a project to develop plastic microchips with controlled microenvironments smaller than a drop of water, for cell growth studies. These microscale life-support systems provide oxygen to the cells, neutralize their waste, and ensure that the cells are well-fed. The goal is to develop microchips that are inexpensive enough for undergraduate labs, as well as research. The microchips will be tested in undergraduate labs by developing modules for undergraduate research projects for an undergraduate course.