Objective
The improvement of the quality of water in general, and drinking water in particular, is one of the top priorities in Europe. The understanding of the factors regulating cyanobacterial and algal blooms are needed to prevent degradation of water quality. To reach this goal, we propose a completely novel approach for the monitoring of aquatic environments and also to give warning of impending algal and cyanobacterial blooms. We will construct a set of cyanobacterial biosensors, that produce a real-time signal dependent on the bioavailability of specific nutrients. It is believed that these new tools, once developed, will be accurate, sensitive and cheap. The strategy suggested for achieving this aim is to fuse two genetic elements: (a) promoter regions of selected cyanobacterial genes regulated by either N, P or Fe availability, that will serve as the sensing element of the final construct; (b)bacterial (lux) bioluminescence genes, to serve as the reporting/signaling element.
Plasmids containing these fusions will be used to transform unicellular cyanobacterial strains; successful transformants will emit light in response to N, P or Fe availability. In parallel, we will monitor the responses of these recombinant strains to nutrient limitation or availability in synthetic media, and later in water samples collected in different water bodies in order to correlate the observed responses with actual environmental conditions. To increase the practicality of the concept, the luminescent sensor strains will be immobilised and "packaged" into an easy-to-use biosensor format that can partially replace the expensive and lengthy chemical determinations, currently in use.
These genetically engineered tools will serve a double purpose: (1) they will function as an early warning system against the development of conditions allowing cyanobacterial blooms and (2) they will help in providing a partial solution to the still largely unanswered question of what are the roles that specific nutritional factors play in the development of such blooms. For this purpose, this project brings together four different laboratories with complementary expertise in: a) cyanobacterial physiology and molecular biology, b) recombinant-sensor strain construction, c) biotechnology in biosensors and d) aquatic ecology. This project is feasible. Partner B has significant expertise in the genetic engineering of luminescent bacterial biosensors and their application to various environmental uses. Partner C has 10 years experience with biosensors, microbial sensors and related immobilisation techniques and will provide a prototype of a portable luminometer to be adapted in this project Partner A has been working with unicellular cyanobacteria for more than 10 years and Partner D is already involved in the study of nutrient availability in water bodies and the relationship between nutrient concentration and cyanobacterial blooms.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- engineering and technology electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering electronic engineering sensors biosensors
- engineering and technology environmental engineering water treatment processes drinking water treatment processes
- natural sciences earth and related environmental sciences hydrology
- natural sciences biological sciences ecology
- natural sciences biological sciences molecular biology
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Coordinator
75230 Paris
France
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