CFD modelling of a spark ignition internal combustion engine fuelled with syngas for a mCHP system

Micro Combined Heat and Power (mCHP) powered with biomass is nowadays a technology attracting increasing interest to develop a local supply chain to produce, process and valorise the available material in territorial areas as much as possible circumscribed, with a considerable reduction also of the CO2 related to transportation. Application for biomass powered mCHP produces environmental benefits by reducing primary energy consumption and associated greenhouse gas emissions and complies with the need for increased decentralization of energy supply. Of particular relevance is mCHP based on biomass gasification due to the negligible particulate matter release with respect to combustion. The present work describes a 3D CFD model of the spark ignition (SI) internal combustion engine (ICE) fuelled with syngas installed in the mCHP pilot system ECO20 manufactured by the Italian company Costruzioni Motori Diesel S.p.A. (CMD). The considered system is made of a gasifier combined with proper syngas cleaning devices, an ICE and a generator to deliver a maximum electrical and thermal power of 20 kW and 40 kW, respectively. For the proper initialisation of the 3D CFD model, the syngas composition is experimentally characterised using a gas-chromatograph on samples collected under real operation. The calculated pressure cycle is verified by comparison with the one calculated through a properly developed 1D ICE model. Main goals of the performed numerical analysis are to study into detail the combustion process and to assess the engine performance characteristics related to the use of syngas

Correlation of cell growth and heterologous protein production by Saccharomyces cerevisiae

With the increasing demand for biopharmaceutical proteins and industrial enzymes, it is necessary to optimize the production by microbial fermentation or cell cultures. Yeasts are well established for the production of a wide range of recombinant proteins, but there are also some limitations; e.g., metabolic and cellular stresses have a strong impact on recombinant protein production. In this work, we investigated the effect of the specific growth rate on the production of two different recombinant proteins. Our results show that human insulin precursor is produced in a growth-associated manner, whereas alpha-amylase tends to have a higher yield on substrate at low specific growth rates. Based on transcriptional analysis, we found that the difference in the production of the two proteins as function of the specific growth rate is mainly due to differences in endoplasmic reticulum processing, protein turnover, cell cycle, and global stress response. We also found that there is a shift at a specific growth rate of 0.1 h(-1) that influences protein production. Thus, for lower specific growth rates, the alpha-amylase and insulin precursor-producing strains present similar cell responses and phenotypes, whereas for higher specific growth rates, the two strains respond differently to changes in the specific growth rate

Tyrosine Phosphorylation of the UDP-Glucose Dehydrogenase of Escherichia coli Is at the Crossroads of Colanic Acid Synthesis and Polymyxin Resistance

BACKGROUND:In recent years, an idiosyncratic new class of bacterial enzymes, named BY-kinases, has been shown to catalyze protein-tyrosine phosphorylation. These enzymes share no structural and functional similarities with their eukaryotic counterparts and, to date, only few substrates of BY-kinases have been characterized. BY-kinases have been shown to participate in various physiological processes. Nevertheless, we are at a very early stage of defining their importance in the bacterial cell. In Escherichia coli, two BY-kinases, Wzc and Etk, have been characterized biochemically. Wzc has been shown to phosphorylate the UDP-glucose dehydrogenase Ugd in vitro. Not only is Ugd involved in the biosynthesis of extracellular polysaccharides, but also in the production of UDP-4-amino-4-deoxy-L-arabinose, a compound that renders E. coli resistant to cationic antimicrobial peptides. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS:Here, we studied the role of Ugd phosphorylation. We first confirmed in vivo the phosphorylation of Ugd by Wzc and we demonstrated that Ugd is also phosphorylated by Etk, the other BY-kinase identified in E. coli. Tyrosine 71 (Tyr71) was characterized as the Ugd site phosphorylated by both Wzc and Etk. The regulatory role of Tyr71 phosphorylation on Ugd activity was then assessed and Tyr71 mutation was found to prevent Ugd activation by phosphorylation. Further, Ugd phosphorylation by Wzc or Etk was shown to serve distinct physiological purposes. Phosphorylation of Ugd by Wzc was found to participate in the regulation of the amount of the exopolysaccharide colanic acid, whereas Etk-mediated Ugd phosphorylation appeared to participate in the resistance of E. coli to the antibiotic polymyxin. CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE:Ugd phosphorylation seems to be at the junction between two distinct biosynthetic pathways, illustrating the regulatory potential of tyrosine phosphorylation in bacterial physiology

Improved production of a heterologous amylase in Saccharomyces cerevisiae by inverse metabolic engineering

The increasing demand for industrial enzymes and biopharmaceutical proteins relies on robust production hosts with high protein yield and productivity. Being one of the best-studied model organisms and capable of performing posttranslational modifications, the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is widely used as a cell factory for recombinant protein production. However, many recombinant proteins are produced at only 1% (or less) of the theoretical capacity due to the complexity of the secretory pathway, which has not been fully exploited. In this study, we applied the concept of inverse metabolic engineering to identify novel targets for improving protein secretion. Screening that combined UV-random mutagenesis and selection for growth on starch was performed to find mutant strains producing heterologous amylase 5-fold above the level produced by the reference strain. Genomic mutations that could be associated with higher amylase secretion were identified through whole-genome sequencing. Several single-point mutations, including an S196I point mutation in the VTA1 gene coding for a protein involved in vacuolar sorting, were evaluated by introducing these to the starting strain. By applying this modification alone, the amylase secretion could be improved by 35%. As a complement to the identification of genomic variants, transcriptome analysis was also performed in order to understand on a global level the transcriptional changes associated with the improved amylase production caused by UV mutagenesis. © 2014, American Society for Microbiology

Heat shock response improves heterologous protein secretion in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

The yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is a widely used platform for the production of heterologous proteins of medical or industrial interest. However, heterologous protein productivity is often low due to limitations of the host strain. Heat shock response (HSR) is an inducible, global, cellular stress response, which facilitates the cell recovery from many forms of stress, e.g., heat stress. In S. cerevisiae, HSR is regulated mainly by the transcription factor heat shock factor (Hsf1p) and many of its targets are genes coding for molecular chaperones that promote protein folding and prevent the accumulation of mis-folded or aggregated proteins. In this work, we over-expressed a mutant HSF1 gene HSF1-R206S which can constitutively activate HSR, so the heat shock response was induced at different levels, and we studied the impact of HSR on heterologous protein secretion. We found that moderate and high level over-expression of HSF1-R206S increased heterologous alpha-amylase yield 25 and 70 % when glucose was fully consumed, and 37 and 62 % at the end of the ethanol phase, respectively. Moderate and high level over-expression also improved endogenous invertase yield 118 and 94 %, respectively. However, human insulin precursor was only improved slightly and this only by high level over-expression of HSF1-R206S, supporting our previous findings that the production of this protein in S. cerevisiae is not limited by secretion. Our results provide an effective strategy to improve protein secretion and demonstrated an approach that can induce ER and cytosolic chaperones simultaneously