Exclusive to ChemE alumni from the honoured class years. A nice casual lunch will be served in the undergraduate common room (WB238) with tours of ChemE labs to follow.
Location:
Room 238, Wallberg Building, 200 College St., Toronto, ON M5S 3E5
Register at http://springreunion.utoronto.ca
Irving O. Shoichet Distinguished Lecture
“Innovation by Evolution: Bringing New Chemistry to Life”
Frances Arnold, California Institute of Technology
“The Role of Hydrometallurgy in Meeting the Supply Chain for Life in the 21st Century”
David Dreisinger, University of British Columbia
Creating economically and environmentally sustainable processes for resource recovery from secondary raw materials is one of the challenges in realizing a circular economy. Activities are on going in our lab with the aim to develop novel processes and techniques for resource recovery. This includes using biochemical tools for resource recovery from wastewater and hydrometallurgy for recovery of valuable elements from consumer products (NiMH batteries) and industrial waste (e.g. apatite, red mud). There has been an increasing demand for rare earth elements (REE) in the last few decades due to their applications in many high-tech products. One of the greatest challenges in the recovery of REE from different sources is their separation from each other, which is very difficult due to their similar properties. We are investigating the separation of REE by various techniques such as supported liquid membrane extraction, adsorption and crystallization. Crystallization and adsorption processes are also of importance for the management of nuclear waste. A deep geological repository must be designed to prevent radionuclide dispersion into the biosphere. We are conducting research to increase the understanding of phenomena of importance for assessing the mobility of radionuclides under deep repository conditions.
Dr. Kerstin Forsberg works as associate professor at the Department of Chemical Engineering at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden, since 2015. Forsberg defended her thesis in 2009 on the topic of crystallization of metal fluoride hydrates from mixed acid solutions. After defending her thesis Forsberg worked as a postdoctoral researcher within an EU funded project on solidification of pharmaceutical intermediates. In 2010 she was appointed assistant professor in chemical engineering in natural systems at KTH. Forsberg was awarded the title docent in chemical engineering in 2016. In the same year Forsberg started the Division of Resource recovery at KTH. The research at the division comprises hydrometallurgy and environmental biotechnology for resource recovery and research related to waste management.
“Curvature Directed Assembly of Colloids at Interfaces”
Kathleen Stebe, University of Pennsylvania
Join BioZone to learn about and discuss the latest advancements in Mass Spectrometry technology. Topics include:
- New developments in mass spectrometry analysis
- Using mass spectrometry to support research
- Starting material requirements, sample prep, and protocol development
Affluence from Effluents: Safe Disposal, Reuse, and Energy Harnessing from Sewage and Biosolids
FAISAL HAI, University of Wollongong
This presentation will provide snapshots of current research focus of the Environmental Biotechnology Laboratory led by Dr. Hai at the University of Wollongong, Australia. Our work underpins the protection of land and water resources from contamination and focuses on the aspects of wastewater treatment and reuse, management of biosolids originating from wastewater treatment plants, and providing environmental solutions for resource and energy development projects.
This presentation will particularly focus on:
Next generation membrane bioreactors (MBRs): high retention MBRs (nanofiltration/ reverse osmosis/ forward osmosis membranes integrated with biological reactors) and enzymatic membrane bioreactors for removal of contaminants of emerging concern e.g., endocrine disruptors. Resource recovery from waste: membrane assisted phosphorus and methane recovery from wastewater/sludge, and enzymatic bioethanol production from solid waste.
FAISAL I. HAI is an Associate Professor at the School of Civil, Mining and Environmental Engineering (CME) of the University of Wollongong (UOW), Australia. He is one of the key teaching and research academics of the Strategic Water Infrastructure Laboratory at CME. A recipient of Japan Society for Promotion of Science fellowship (2007- 2009) and UOW Vice Chancellor’s fellowship (2010), Dr. Hai was awarded the outstanding lecturer award by the Japanese Society on Water Environment in 2010, and UOW Vice Chancellor’s Outstanding Contribution to Teaching and Learning Award in 2015. Building on his vast experience of working with Professor Kazuo Yamamoto, the inventor of the membrane bioreactor (MBR) technology, at the University of Tokyo, he continues to carry out exciting research on the application of hybrid membrane processes for the removal of biologically persistent compounds (especially micropollutants) from water and wastewater. Dr. Hai is the lead editor of a recent book, Membrane Biological Reactors, published by the International Water Association. Dr. Hai also serves as an Associate Editor of the renowned journal, Water Science & Technology (IWA Publishing, UK) and Journal of Water and Environment Technology (Japan Society on Water Environment).
Oxidative stress has been suggested to be the primary toxic pathway of air particulate matter (PM) to cause cardiovascular disease and other adverse effects. In this talk, oxidative stress was demonstrated as the primary toxic pathway for both disinfection by-products (DBPs) in drinking water, and oil sands-processed water (OPSW). To this end, a hybrid platform was established in our group to identify toxic components and their modes of action (MOA) from these critical environmental matrices. High-throughput and reproducible in vitro cell reporter system was used to determine the Nrf2-mediated oxidative stress response from environmental mixtures. Then, Effect-Directed Analysis (EDA) and chemical probe, combined with untargeted chemical analysis, were used accordingly to identify toxic components. Specifically, more than 600 DBPs were identified in the drinking water after disinfection and direct reaction with cysteine was elucidated as the primary pathway for DBPs to cause oxidative stress. Accordingly, a biotin/cysteine chemical probe was synthesized to identify toxic DBPs. For OSPW whose oxidative stress may primarily be caused by indirect pathways, EDA combined with untargeted chemical analysis was used to identify hydroxylated aldehydes as the primary toxic components. Studies regarding PM samples are still ongoing, and preliminary data shown that chemical probe is an efficient approach to identify toxic components (i.e. quinone) in PM samples. Thus, our hybrid platform may provide a versatile and accessible approach in elucidating the oxidative stress promoting components in a variety of environmental matrices.
DETAILS: Uoft.me/SOCAAR1NOV17
Design of bioswitches and cellular robots for metabolic engineering and synthetic biology
Professor An-Ping Zeng,
Institute of Bioprocess and Biosystems Engineering,
Hamburg University of Technology
Despite impressive progresses in systems metabolic engineering and synthetic biology there are still several unsolved major problems in their practical applications for developing effective metabolic pathways and microorganisms for biosynthesis, including:
- identification of targets for advanced pathway engineering of productive strains, especially under industrially relevant and in vivo conditions;
- effective means with proper dynamic range and sensitivity for dynamic and concerted control of metabolic pathways;
- designed elements or devices from synthetic biology often not work well within the host cells, especially for highly productive strains;
- mathematical models of cellular processes often miss regulatory details inside cells and thus fail to guide biomolecular and cellular design.
In this presentation, I will illustrate some of our recent efforts to address these questions. First, I will present results on rational design of bioswitches (riboswitch and ligand-introduced allosteric regulation) with improved dynamic range and sensitivity for dynamic control of metabolic pathways. Then, I will address the question how we can use the host cell as “a computer or robot” to identify targets, evaluate designed parts and even to evolve the best design for a specific purpose? Cells are capable of information processing, rapid replication and performing tasks adaptively and ultra-sensitively. The key issue is how to let the cells “to compute or evaluate” the processes we are interested in and how “to output” the right results corresponding to the different inputs? To this end, we have used E. coli as an example to rein the computation abilities of cells by designing high throughput input and sensitive output systems based on its interaction with bacteriophage. The method is successfully demonstrated for target identification, evaluation of designs, evolution and selection of key enzymes for lysine bioproduction in E. coli.
“Optimising Structure-Property Dependencies of Stochastic Materials by Probabilistic Modelling”
William Sampson, University of Manchester