Team:Oxford/biopolymer containment
From 2014.igem.org
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A primary function of the beads is to maximise reaction rate per bead volume, since halving the radius of a sphere doubles its surface area:volume ratio. A large number of small, bacteria-embedded agarose beads (to a technical limit) are therefore optimal, as more bacteria will be closer to the surface of each bead and can metabolise DCM efficiently. Assuming brownian motion, substrate molecules are more likely to collide with and be broken down by ‘outer’ bacteria. Product molecules, additionally, have a shorter path length to the surface and are likely to diffuse out faster: | A primary function of the beads is to maximise reaction rate per bead volume, since halving the radius of a sphere doubles its surface area:volume ratio. A large number of small, bacteria-embedded agarose beads (to a technical limit) are therefore optimal, as more bacteria will be closer to the surface of each bead and can metabolise DCM efficiently. Assuming brownian motion, substrate molecules are more likely to collide with and be broken down by ‘outer’ bacteria. Product molecules, additionally, have a shorter path length to the surface and are likely to diffuse out faster: | ||
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- | <img src="https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2014/ | + | <img src="https://static.igem.org/mediawiki/2014/5/56/Oxford_polymer1.jpg" style="float:left;position:relative; width:70%;margin-left:15%;margin-right:15%;margin-bottom:2%;" /> |
Assuming ρ (a coefficient of bacterial density), to be independent of r (distance from bead center) and R (bead radius), avg. bacterium-surface distance = | Assuming ρ (a coefficient of bacterial density), to be independent of r (distance from bead center) and R (bead radius), avg. bacterium-surface distance = |
Revision as of 15:14, 17 October 2014