Date of Award:

12-2011

Document Type:

Thesis

Degree Name:

Master of Science (MS)

Department:

Biological Engineering

Committee Chair(s)

Dean H. Scott Hinton

Committee

Dean H. Scott Hinton

Committee

Ronald C. Sims

Committee

Charles D. Miller

Abstract

Plastics are a versatile and widely used material. However, traditional plastics are derived from petrochemicals and are not biodegradable. Polymers synthesized from microorganisms that have similar properties to plastic are potential biodegradable replacements. The objective of this project is to use mathematical modeling as a tool to engineer a strain of bacteria optimized for the production of bio-plastics.

Production costs can be reduced by using a bacterial strain specifically optimized for bio-plastic production. By reducing production costs, bio-plastics will be able to commercially compete with traditional plastics. Society will benefit as bio-plastics replace traditional plastics. Fossil fuels will not be depleted by the production of traditional plastics, and the bio-plastics will biodegrade in landfills.

The costs of this research are nominal. Developing a model takes only time and minimal laboratory work. An effective predictive model will reduce laboratory time and cost because it will indicate how to efficiently engineer a microorganism strain optimized for the production of bio-plastics. This design process can also be used to develop predictive models for the production of other bioproducts such as biofuels, biomaterials, and biopharmaceuticals.

Checksum

4eea89d74dbd1ced1be6d44e3a336902

Comments

Publication made available electronically December 21, 2011.

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