Module 8 - Microbial Biotechnology Flashcards
(43 cards)
What term describes the use of biological processes or organisms for the production of goods?
Biotechnology
What are potential byproducts of microbial synthesis?
Food additives, solvents, enzymes, biofuels, agrochemicals, whole cells, fine chemicals
What are desirable products harvested from biotechnology?
Enzymes with a desired catalytic activity, or the degradation of an environmental contaminant
Obtaining microbes with characteristics that are useful or critical for specific biotechnology applications is defined as?
Bioprospecting
Any industrial process involving the culture of microorganisms, either aerobic or anaerobic, for the production of desired substances is termed?
Fermentation
Where do industrial fermentations take place?
Large-culture vessels called bioreactors
What do bioreactors maximize and yield?
Maximize cell density; yield product
What is controlled during the process of fermentation?
Environmental conditions
- Nutrients, oxygen, pH, and temperature
What are the two basic designs of bioreactors?
- Fed batch reactor
- Chemostat
Which bioreactor supports very high cell densities by providing the culture with a growth-limiting nutrient, such as a carbon source, over time?
Fed-batch reactor
Which process (Fed-batch or chemostat) controls the growth rate and can prevent the production of non-desired side products?
Fed-batch reactor
Which bioreactor is continuous and as an equivalent amount of culture is removed, a new medium is added?
Chemostat
What does a continuous addition of fresh medium control in a chemostat?
Growth rate and physiological steady state
What are the 4 phases of a growth curve?
- Lag phase
- Exponential phase
- Stationary phase
- Death phase
What two factors are varied and produced depending on the particular growth phase of a cell?
- Metabolic pathways
- Metabolites produced
How are two ways that beneficial genetic alterations (mutations) are generated in microbes?
- Random
- Site-directed
Exposure of cells to X-rays, or DNA-damaging chemicals that cause mutations in the DNA of a cell is known as which type of mutagenesis?
Random
When is random mutagenesis appropriate?
When a researcher may not know all the cellular processes that impact the phenotype they desire to affect
Example of random mutagenesis?
Penicillin production
Which type of mutagenesis allows researchers to make specific mutations at specific known sites with a DNA molecule?
Site-directed
Methods to modify genomes directly is a process called?
Genome editing
Two types of site-directed mutagenesis?
- PCR
- Oligonucleotide
Why would one need to do site-directed mutagenesis?
To study changes in protein activity that occur as a result of the DNA manipulation
What are specifically designed to produce recombinant proteins?
Expression vectors
