Metabolic engineering for a clean environment: cell factories for removal and valorisation of heavy metal wastes
Heavy metal pollution significantly threatens environmental and human health, necessitating innovative remediation strategies. Bioremediation, employing organisms engineered to accumulate and transform contaminants, offers a promising, eco-friendly solution. Cell4NanoMet project aims to utilize metabolic engineering to develop organisms capable of concurrently removing heavy metals and converting them into valuable products, such as nanoparticles and nanoalloys.
Main domain
Food, bioeconomy, natural resources, biodiversity, agriculture and environment (ASC); Bioeconomy (DSIN); Environment and Eco-technologies (DSIN)
Main subdomain
Biodiversity recovery, conservation and sustainable restoration of ecosystems and ecosystem services
Secondary domain
Food, bioeconomy, natural resources, biodiversity, agriculture and environment (ASC); Bioeconomy (DSIN); Environment and Eco-technologies (DSIN)
Secondary subdomain
Circular bioeconomy
Tertiary domain
Food, bioeconomy, natural resources, biodiversity, agriculture and environment (ASC); Bioeconomy (DSIN); Environment and Eco-technologies (DSIN)
Tertiary subdomain
Water resources management and sustainable development of fisheries and aquaculture
Coordinator
University of Bucharest (UB)
Project director: Dr. Lavinia Ruta
Partner
APEL LASER S.R.L.
Objective 1
Designing efficient cell factories using yeast-based techniques to accumulate heavy metals and produce metal nanoparticles (MeNPs) via Yeast Molecular Display Technology.
Objective 2
Assessing the toxic effects of MeNPs on cells and identifying natural antioxidants to mitigate toxicity, leveraging Saccharomyces cerevisiae as a model organism.
Objective 3
Scaling up the developed techniques to pilot scale and employ natural antioxidants to enhance the life span of MeNP-exposed cell factories. This multidisciplinary approach holds promise for sustainable remediation and resource recovery from heavy metal pollution.