Transnational approaches to resolving biological bottlenecks in macroalgal biofuel production (SuBBSea)

绿色巨藻是英国海滩和海岸线上最常见的景观之一，为许多海洋动物提供食物和庇护所。这些绿色海藻中最为人所熟知的是石榴属植物，也就是“海生菜”。这一点尤为重要，因为它们充当了陆地和海洋之间的纽带；农业化肥或城市污水处理厂的养分流失增加，可能会导致农田和城市交界的河流和海洋中的营养水平更高。这些丰富的海水也可以通过营养丰富的深海春季涌流自然产生，反过来，可以看到生活在其中的海藻异常快速的生长；所谓的绿色浪潮可以扼杀全球沿海水域，并对2008年青岛奥运会帆船赛造成威胁，2010年覆盖了英国南海岸的海滩，每年都会污染布雷顿海岸。我们的项目旨在通过将绿色海藻转化为燃料来促进这些惊人的增长速度。我们将首先使用标准的作物育种技术(而不是转基因技术)来生产经济上有生产力的海藻品种，这些品种可以在英国海岸线安全和可持续地种植。一旦海藻被收获，我们将研究如何利用海藻分解的自然过程，提取能够将海藻生物量转化为英国经济未来几年所需的先进生物燃料的酶和微生物。

The green macroalgae, or seaweeds, are one of the most common sights on beaches and shorelines around the UK, providing food and shelter for many marine animals. The most familiar of these green seaweeds are the Ulva species; the 'sea lettuces'. These are particularly important because they act as a link between the land and the seas; increased nutrient run-off from agricultural fertilisers, or from urban sewage treatment plants, can lead to higher nutrient levels in the rivers and seas that border farmlands and cities. These enriched waters, which can also occur naturally through the spring upwelling of nutrient-rich deeper sea waters, can, in turn, see extraordinarily rapid growth of the seaweeds that live in them; the so-called 'green tides' that can choke coastal waters worldwide and which are responsible for threatening the Olympic sailing regatta at Qingdao in 2008, covering beaches along the south coast of the UK in 2010, and fouling the Breton coast annually.Our project aims to build on these astonishing growth rates by converting green seaweeds into fuel. We will start by using standard crop-breeding techniques (rather than genetic modification) to produce economically productive seaweed strains that can be grown safely and sustainably around the UK's coastline. Once they've been harvested, we will look at how to harness the natural processes by which seaweeds are broken down, extracting enzymes and microbes capable of converting seaweed biomass into the advanced biofuels that the UK economy will need in the years ahead.