Photoautotroph-Methanotroph Coculture - A Flexible Platform for Efficient Biological CO2-CH4 Co-utilization

Industrial, municipal, and agricultural waste streams contain stranded organic carbon, which can be converted into biogas through anaerobic digestion. It has been demonstrated that biogas has immense potential as a renewable feedstock for producing high-density fuels and commodity chemicals. However, the utilization of biogas presents a significant challenge due to its low pressure and presence of contaminants such as H2S, ammonia, and volatile organic carbon compounds To tap into this immense potential, effective biotechnologies that co-utilize both CO2 and CH4 are needed. Using the basic metabolic coupling principles utilized by many natural consortia, we have demonstrated that photoautotroph-methanotroph co-cultures offers a flexible and highly promising platform for biological CO2/CH4 co-utilization. In this work, we present the very first effort to quantitatively model the growth dynamics of a photoautotroph-methanotroph coculture, as well as the experimental and computational tools that are required to characterize the coculture. Together, these advancements will enable us to further examine the potential interspecies interactions within the coculture. (C) 2019, IFAC (International Federation of Automatic Control) Hosting by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.