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Team:University of Ottawa/Project
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Overall project
- When large quantities of protein are required for industrial, pharmaceutical and research purposes, researchers may resort to expression of the loci of interest in a genetically modified organism. Once these transgenic organisms are built, they will be grown to sufficient titer before undergoing extraction for the protein of interest. In the case of microorganisms, this is performed in large bioreactors, where the protein of interest will be extracted from a continuously growing cell culture. When the protein of interest is excessively large or toxic to the cell, synthesis by the organism is difficult, and the use of bioreactors is limited. In the bioreactor, a small subpopulation of cells emerges, where the cells are not expressing the protein correctly. This subpopulation soon dominates due to positive selective pressure, and the use of the bioreactor becomes less effective with time. After a couple of months, the bioreactor will become inefficient, and will have to be “restarted”, a long and costly process. The goal of this year’s uOttawa iGEM team consists of generating a yeast strain capable of long term protein expression.
