Wednesday, November 27, 2019

Engineering E. coli


E.coli bacteria.
Researchers have begun growing a strand of modified E coli that consumes carbon dioxide instead of sugars to grow and survive. The E coli was given a gene that allowed it to gin energy from formate and raised generations on a low sugar diet to try and force a mutation. The entire cycle took years until a strain that only needed CO2 formed, but the strain still prefers sugar and reproduces at an extremely slow rate compared to normal strands of E. coli.

This research is really interesting as it involves a model organism and trying to modify it to become autotrophic. I honestly didn't think anything like this was possible. The research has proven to be fruitful however and there are many possible benefits to using this modified strand.

Article:https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-03679-x

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