Sterilized tobacco leaves as biomass source for a biorefinery: CAS QIBEBT

https://www.cell.com/the-innovation/fulltext/S2666-6758(24)00125-5

https://www.cas.cn/syky/202408/t20240823_5029609.shtml

A research team led by Zhang Haibo and Fu Chunxiang, researchers at the Qingdao Institute of Bioenergy and Bioprocess Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, in collaboration with Wang Qian, a researcher at the Tobacco Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, and Sang Yup Lee, a professor at the Korea Institute of Science and Technology, found that tobacco can be used as an energy crop to achieve efficient and low-carbon utilization of biomass energy and help the sustainable development of biorefining. Compared with traditional biomass raw materials, tobacco leaves have the characteristics of high water solubility, high nitrogen content and low lignocellulose content. After the tobacco leaves are sterilized with water, a liquid with comprehensive and rich nutrition and strong biocompatibility can be obtained. This liquid can be used as a culture medium directly for the cultivation of prokaryotes and eukaryotes, and can also be directly used for the biosynthesis of bio-based fuels and bio-based chemicals.

In addition, tobacco is a field crop with strong stress resistance, salt and alkali tolerance, large biomass, and easy genetic modification, and can adapt well to the environment of marginal land. Planting tobacco on marginal land is expected to produce at least 1.17×1010 Mg of tobacco leaves per year, and theoretically 2.21×1012 L of ethanol. The results of life cycle assessment show that compared with corn straw ethanol, tobacco ethanol has reduced carbon emissions by about 27% and energy consumption by about 26%. Among them, carbon emissions in the bioconversion stage have been reduced by about 76% and energy consumption has been reduced by about 81%. This study directly sterilized tobacco leaves as a culture medium, omitted two steps, improved the biorefining route, reduced carbon footprint, and laid the foundation for achieving carbon negative emissions from bioenergy utilization.

more insights

A new Fischer-Tropsch route which eliminates CO2 formation

https://en.people.cn/n3/2025/1031/c90000-20384954.html

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aea0774

A group at Peking University has developed technology that almost completely eliminates carbon dioxide by-products during Fischer-Tropsch synthesis (FTS), offering a new route to green syngas conversion and low-carbon chemical manufacturing. FTS converts the syngas of carbon dioxide and hydrogen into liquid fuels or high-value chemicals such as olefins. It serves as the pivotal bridge for turning coal, natural gas, biomass and other carbon resources into fuels and value-added chemicals.

The researchers have used a sodium-modified FeC_x@Fe₃O₄ core-shell catalyst coupling water-gas shift (WGS) with syngas-to-olefins (STO) to convert water into hydrogen in situ. HAE reaches about 66 to 83%, exceeding that of methanol-to-olefins (MTO, 50% upper limit). The approximately 95% carbon monoxide conversion and >75% olefin selectivity were simultaneously obtained. The coupling effect was validated by isotope tracing with deuterium oxide and blocking the WGS pathway, and the contribution of WGS was quantitatively evaluated. These results, using lower hydrogen to carbon monoxide ratios, implied that reducing steam consumption in the WGS reaction and reducing the overall output of carbon dioxide and wastewater enabled a sustainable STO process for potential industrialization.

An automated digital colony picker monitors growth and metabolite production, eliminating the need for culturing cells

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-025-63929-7

http://english.cas.cn/newsroom/research_news/life/202510/t20251014_1089412.shtml

The group around Jian XU from the CAS Qingdao Institute of Bioenergy and Bioprocess Technology (QIBEBT) has developed a fully automated “Digital Colony Picker” (DCP). This device identifies and retrieves high-performance microbial clones by simultaneously monitoring their growth and metabolite production—eliminating the need for culture plates, sampling needles, or manual picking.

Designed for the “design-build-test-learn” framework widely adopted in synthetic biology, the DCP streamlines the traditionally slow, labor-intensive “test” phase into a fast, parallel workflow with little hands-on time. It has a microfluidic chip containing 16,000 addressable microchambers that isolate single cells and track their expansion into micro-colonies. An integrated AI engine conducts time-lapse analysis of both brightfield and biosensor signals to quantify growth kinetics and metabolite production in real time. Once target colonies are identified, a laser-induced bubble technique exports them as droplets directly into standard culture plates. This contact-free transfer minimizes cross-contamination and preserves cell viability.

The equipment which was tested for identifying high-yield or lactate-tolerant Zymomonas mobilis mutants is broadly applicable to adaptive evolution studies, functional gene discovery, and phenotype screening across diverse microbial species.

Epigenetic modifications help algae to adapt to low CO2 environments

http://english.cas.cn/newsroom/research_news/life/202510/t20251010_1089023.shtml

https://www.cell.com/plant-communications/pdf/S2590-3462(25)00296-2.pdf?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS2590346225002962%3Fshowall%3Dtrue

A research team from the Qingdao Institute of Bioenergy and Bioprocess Technology (QIBEBT) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has identified a specific histone modification as the key regulator governing microalgae’s adaptation to low-CO₂environments.

The study focused on Nannochloropsis oceanica, tracking its epigenomic dynamics as it transitioned from an environment with 5% CO₂ to one with just 0.01% CO₂. Using multi-dimensional epigenomic sequencing techniques, the researchers discovered that global DNA methylation in the alga remained stable at 0.13%, effectively ruling out DNA methylation as a major driver of its low-CO₂response. By contrast, H3K4me2 methylationwas found to be closely associated with 43.1% of the genes that respond to low-CO₂ conditions. These genes include those critical to photosynthesis and ribosome biogenesis, two processes essential for the alga’s survival under carbon-limited stress. Further analysis revealed that H3K4me2 appears to regulate gene transcription by altering chromatin accessibility, a mechanism that aligns with its role as a central regulator of low-CO₂ adaptation.

To validate their findings, the team used CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing technology. They knocked out NO24G02310—a gene that encodes an H3K4 methyltransferase, the enzyme responsible for adding methyl groups to H3K4. The modified algae showed a roughly 22% reduction in growth rate and a 15% decrease in biomass. Additionally, the levels of another histone modification (H3K4me1) dropped, and the genome-wide localization of H3K4me2 shifted—providing direct evidence of H3K4me2’s role in low-CO₂ adaptation. Further experiments uncovered that H3K4 modification may act via two pathways: by regulating enzyme networks and by modulating chloroplast transmembrane pH gradients. Both mechanisms work to optimize the alga’s use of available CO₂, enhancing its survival under low-carbon conditions.

Back to …

青岛 Qingdao
a hub for S&T