Biomimetic reusable microfluidic reactors with physically immobilized RuBisCO for glucose precursor production

Abstract

Chloroplast of plants is a natural microfluidic reactor for natural photosynthesis, in which, the multi-enzymatic Calvin cycle is the key. In chloroplast, the Calvin cycle enzymes are reportedly attached to...

Thylakoid-Inspired Microreactors Continuously Synthesize CO2 into Glucose Precursor at 15.8 nmol min-1

“…This implies that there are few opportunities for active centers to interact with PEI, thus precluding an effect on RuBisCO activity. However, for physical adsorption, as presented in a previous work 13 , hydrophobic sites prevail near the active center (Supplementary Fig. 8d), which may greatly affect the exposure of active sites and RuBisCO activity.…”

“…The kinetic parameters, including Michaelis-Menten constant (K m ), implying the a nity of enzyme for the substrate, maximal reaction rate (V max ), turnover number (k cat ) and catalytic e ciency (k cat /K m ) were estimated for (PEI/RuBisCO) 4 -PMRs and (PEI/RuBisCO) 1 -PMRs. This was accomplished by experimentally evaluating the activity of RuBisCO immobilized by LBL assembly with varying concentrations of RuBP substrate and comparing the results with free RuBisCO and other immobilization methods in the previous studies 12,13 . For the case of n = 1, the (PEI/RuBisCO) 1 assembly had a K m value of 0.378 mM and a V max value of 1.146 mmol min − 1 g − 1 RuBisCO, which were higher than those of free RuBisCO (i.e., 0.049 mM and 0.169 mmol min − 1 g − 1 RuBisCO, Supplementary Fig.…”

“…This feature inspired some studies to immobilize RuBisCO on arti cial structures with enhanced selectivity, stability and reusablity 9-11 . Zhu et al presented an advanced immobilization method for RuBisCO within micro uidic reactors that mimicked the uidic environment of chloroplasts, demonstrating the continuous production of glucose precursor 12,13 . Enzymes immobilized on micro uidic reactors can be easily isolated from products, therefore precluding contamination and the need for additional enzyme inactivation and separation steps 14,15 .…”

A versatile optofluidic microreactor for artificial photosynthesis induced coenzyme regeneration and l-glutamate synthesis

“…Luckily, inspired by natural photosynthesis, artificial photosynthesis has the ability to improve the coenzyme regeneration efficiency by better utilizing solar energy and improving the conversion efficiency. [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19] Similar to the natural photosynthesis occurring in a thylakoid, a high surface-to-volume ratio "microreactor", the design of artificial microreactors is crucial for the improvement of photocatalysis efficiency because they determine the distribution of catalysts, the exposure of light, the efficiency of photon transmission, the velocity of mass transport and so on. 20,21 A good photoreactor is preferred to present the merits of low cost, easy fabrication, high transparency, being evaporation proof, ease of scaling up, and high surface-to-volume ratio.…”

“…Luckily, inspired by natural photosynthesis, artificial photosynthesis has the ability to improve the coenzyme regeneration efficiency by better utilizing solar energy and improving the conversion efficiency. 8–19…”