Cover Picture: Engineering in Life Sciences 1'13

Engineering in Life Sciences covers all technological aspects of Industrial, Environmental, Plant and Food Biotechnology, especially those related to the new, emerging fields of interest: White Biotechnology and Bioenergy. Cover image: Bioprocess structure (foreground), © Reiner Luttmann (HAW Hamburg, Germany), Photo‐bioreactor (right), Green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii (background), © Clemens Posten (KIT, Karlsruhe, Germany), Gears (front left) © Gettyimages     

Cover Picture: Engineering in Life Sciences 6'12

Engineering in Life Sciences covers all technological aspects of Industrial, Environmental, Plant and Food Biotechnology, especially those related to the new, emerging fields of interest: White Biotechnology and Bioenergy. Cover image: Bioprocess structure (foreground), © Reiner Luttmann (HAW Hamburg, Germany), Photo‐bioreactor (right), Green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii (background), © Clemens Posten (KIT, Karlsruhe, Germany), Gears (front left), © Gettyimages     

Cover Picture: Engineering in Life Sciences 5'12

Engineering in Life Sciences covers all technological aspects of Industrial, Environmental, Plant and Food Biotechnology, especially those related to the new, emerging fields of interest: White Biotechnology and Bioenergy. Cover image: Bioprocess structure (foreground), © Reiner Luttmann (HAW Hamburg, Germany), Photo‐bioreactor (right), Green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii (background), © Clemens Posten (KIT, Karlsruhe, Germany), Gears (front left), © Gettyimages     

Plant Biotechnology

Cover illustration This Special Issue of Biotechnology Journal is edited by Prof. Eva Stöger and covers the latest breakthroughs in plant biotechnology. The cover image shows genetically modified corn producing an anti-HIV antibody along with DsRed as a visual marker. Image courtesy of Dr. Thomas Rademacher (RWTH and Fraunhofer IME, Aachen, Germany). Border around image: © boulemon – Fotolia.com.     

Bioprocess Scale-up/down

Cover illustration: Scale-up and scale-down strategies are a key for successful implementation of bioprocesses in industry. This issue of Biotechnology Journal, edited by Peter Neubauer (TU Berlin, Germany), features articles on methods for improved scale-up and -down strategies, e.g. measuring CO₂ gradients, drop breakage analysis and study of metabolic stress. One review article by Alvin Nienow presents strategies for improved beer production (http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/biot.201000414 ). Cover image: Outdoor fermentation vessels at a Spanish brewery. ©Olaf Hendel (Versuchs- und Lehranstalt für Brauerei in Berlin (VLB) e.V.).     

Asian Federation of Biotechnology (AFOB)

Cover illustration: This issue is the first official special issue of Biotechnology Journal with the Asian Federation of Biotechnology (AFOB). In the cover, we use the grain as a symbol and analogy for biotechnology, as both the grain and biotechnology are common and uniting factors that link the member countries of the AFOB. Gran image credit: © Myimagine– Fotolia.com.     

Cover Picture: Biotechnology Journal 1/2013

Cover illustration Special issue: Methods and Advances Progress in biotechnology research relies heavily on innovative ideas and approaches. Every year, Biotechnology Journal publishes a “Methods and Advances” Special Issue, which covers the latest cutting-edge research and breakthrough technologies. For this issue's cover, we chose a design featuring 12 light bulbs, representing the 12 months of the year, each with state-of-the-art research. Image credits: ©Kletr, ©Natis, ©Sarunyu_foto, ©Scanrail, ©Sergey Niven, ©Thaut Images, ©Yahia LOUKKAL, all from Fotolia.com.     

Cover Picture: Biotechnology Journal 11/2012

This “regular” issue of Biotechnology Journal gathers the state‐of‐the‐art in biotechnology, with articles on bioenergy, biofuels, medical biotechnology, biomaterials, etc. Image: © Sergej Khackimullin – Fotolia.com.     

Imaging Host-Pathogen Interactions

Cover illustration: Imaging host-pathogen interactions. This special issue of Biotechnology Journal contains selected contributions from participants of a symposium that took place in September 2008 in Heidelberg, Germany. Guest editors are Spencer Shorte (Institut Pasteur, Paris) and Freddy Frischknecht (Heidelberg University). The background drawing by 5-year old Ariel Amino shows a Plasmodium sporozoite entering a blood vessel (red) in the skin (yellow) as observed with a microscope (blue). The small panels show a malaria parasite infected liver cell (top), Shigella flexneri caught in neutrophil extracellular traps and Aspergillus conidia interacting with a neutrophil (courtesy of S. Graewe, V. Heussler, V. Brinkmann and M. Gunzer reproduced partly from S. Lepper, Cell. Microbiol. 2009, 11, 855–862).     

Protein Design and Evolution for Biocatalysis

Cover illustration: Protein Design and Evolution for Biocatalysis. This special issue of Biotechnology Journal contains selected contributions from scientists participating to the ESF-EMBO Symposium which took place in October 2008 in San Feliu, Spain. Guest Editor is the chair and organizer of the meeting, Jiri Damborsky from Brno (Czech Republic). He highlights a variety of topics brought up in the meeting, ranging from new methods of rational design, directed evolution, metagenomics and single-molecule techniques, to construction of useful enzymes for industrial applications. Uwe Bornscheuer (Greifswald, Germany) authored a meeting report. Image colored pencils, © PhotoDisc, Inc.; Protein logo © ESF.     

Enantioselective Degradation of the Chiral Fungicides Metalaxyl and Furalaxyl by Brevibacillus brevis

For almost four decades, the chiral fungicides metalaxyl and furalaxyl have been in use in plant protection on a global scale. Both substances are distributed as racemic mixtures, yet the desirable interference in nucleic acid synthesis of harmful fungi only occurs by the (‐)‐R‐enantiomer. As enantioselective degradation in Scheyern (Germany) and Yaoundé (Cameroon) soils has been documented, the influence of 50 isolated microorganisms on the R/S ratio was investigated. A high‐pressure liquid chromatography method with a chiral column to separate enantiomers of metalaxyl and furalaxyl, and subsequent detection by tandem mass spectrometry, was employed. Only one of these microorganisms, a strain of Brevibacillus brevis, showed an enantioselective degradation pattern in liquid culture; the respective (‐)‐R‐enantiomers were preferably degraded. Moreover, (‐)‐R‐furalaxyl was degraded faster in cultures supplemented simultaneously with both fungicides of the same concentration. Chirality 25:336–340, 2013. © 2013 Wiley‐Liss Inc. Chirality 00:000‐000:, 2013. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Oil and eicosapentaenoic acid production by the diatom Phaeodactylum tricornutum cultivated outdoors in Green Wall Panel (GWP®) reactors

Phaeodactylum tricornutum is a widely studied diatom and has been proposed as a source of oil and polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA), particularly eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA). Recent studies indicate that lipid accumulation occurs under nutritional stress. Aim of this research was to determine how changes in nitrogen availability affect productivity, oil yield, and fatty acid (FA) composition of P. tricornutum UTEX 640. After preliminary laboratory trials, outdoor experiments were carried out in 40‐L GWP® reactors under different nitrogen regimes in batch. Nitrogen replete cultures achieved the highest productivity of biomass (about 18 g m^?2 d^?1) and EPA (about 0.35 g m^?2 d^?1), whereas nitrogen‐starved cultures achieved the highest FA productivity (about 2.6 g m^?2 d^?1). The annual potential yield of P. tricornutum grown outdoors in GWP® reactors is 730 kg of EPA per hectare under nutrient‐replete conditions and 5,800 kg of FA per hectare under nitrogen starvation. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2017;114: 2204–2210. © 2017 The Authors. Biotechnology and Bioengineering Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

     

Biomolecular Engineering

Cover illustration: Biotechnology Journal's latest Special Issue on “Biomolecular Engineering” is based peer-reviewed papers derived from some of the best presentations at the 4^th International Conference on Biomolecular Engineering. The cover is a snapshot of solvated HER4/ErbB4 kinase domain with juxtamembrane region; image provided by Ravi Radhakrishnan.     

The skull of an early Late Triassic aetosaur and the evolution of the stagonolepidid archosaurian reptiles

Disarticulated bones of several individuals recovered from the Late Triassic fluvial and lacustrine deposits at Krasiejów, Poland, are here described, allowing the restoration of the skull structure of a new aetosaurian archosaur: Stagonolepis olenkae sp. nov. The Krasiejów deposits probably correspond in age to the Lehrberg Beds (late Carnian) of Baden‐Württemberg, Germany. The stratigraphical position of the new taxon combined with other available evidence is used to propose a model of aetosaurian evolution. The proposed phylogenetic position of Aetosaurus ferratus (Norian, Germany) as the basal aetosaurid is refuted and this species is instead proposed to be the most derived member of the Stagonolepis–Aetosaurus evolutionary lineage. Gradual change in several morphological characters can be observed from Stagonolepis robertsoni, through the new species from Krasiejów, to the stratigraphically youngest Aetosaurus ferratus. These changes include a decrease in the number of teeth and a decrease in the convexity of the ventral profile of the maxilla. The anterior elongation of the maxilla is associated with the expansion of the anterior tip of the maxilla towards the naris. In S. robertsoni and S. olenkae, the maxilla extends to middle of the naris, whereas in Aetosaurus, it reaches the anterior half of the naris. © 2010 The Linnean Society of London, Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, 2010, 158 , 860–881.     

Morphological variation in Bosmina longirostris (O.F. Müller, 1785) (Crustacea: Cladocera): consequence of cyclomorphosis or indication of cryptic species?

Samples of the polymorphic cladoceran Bosmina longirostris were collected in several lakes and ponds in Western Germany between 1993 and 1999. The shape of the first antennule was used as a qualitative criterion to classify 1241 individuals to three morphs (`longirostris', `cornuta', `pellucida') according to Lieder (Crustacea: Cladocera: Bosminidae. Stuttgart, Germany: Gustav. Fischer Verlag, 1996). Eight morphometric variables were subsequently measured in each individual to quantify size‐ and shape‐related features. Principal component and discriminant analyses were used to describe the morphological variation within and among the three morphs. Seasonal environmental changes modified several traits and thus, cyclomorphosis accounted for a high proportion of within‐morph variation. However, there was no gradual change from one morph to another. As well among‐morph variation was considerably greater than within‐morph variation. Consequently, the disagreement between the qualitative pre‐classification and the assignment basing on morphometric discriminant functions was low (4.6–12.0%). Considering that each morph is morphologically well‐defined, and that the different morphs coexisted over several generations in the same lake we conclude that they represent different species rather than variants of one polymorphic species. Therefore, we recognize beside the nominal taxon Bosmina longirostris ( 26 ) two more species: Bosmina cornuta ( 10 ) and Bosmina pellucida 30 .     

Crystallization and preliminary X-Ray analysis of recombinant staphylokinase

Diffraction quality crystals of recombinant staphylokinase (STAR) have been grown by the hanging drop vapor diffusion technique from a solution containing MgCl₂, Tris buffer (pH 8.5), and polyethylene glycol 4000. The crystals belong to the monoclinic space group C2 with unit cell dimensions a = 60.6 Å, b = 43.7 Å, c = 54.3 Å, and β = 115.6°. Å complete native data set to 1.8 Å resolution has been collected using synchrotron radiation. Proteins 27:160–161 © 1997 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

EGFR‐targeted Chimeras of Pseudomonas ToxA released into the extracellular milieu by attenuated Salmonella selectively kill tumor cells

Tumor‐targeted Salmonella VNP20009 preferentially replicate within tumor tissue and partially suppress tumor growth in murine tumor models. These Salmonella have the ability to locally induce apoptosis when they are in direct contact with cancer cells but they lack significant bystander killing, which may correlate with their overall lack of antitumor activity in human clinical studies. In order to compensate for this deficiency without enhancing overall toxicity, we engineered the bacteria to express epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)‐targeted cytotoxic proteins that are released into the extracellular milieu. In this study, we demonstrate the ability of the Salmonella strain VNP20009 to produce three different forms of the Pseudomonas exotoxin A (ToxA) chimeric with a tumor growth factor alpha (TGFα) which results in its producing culture supernatants that are cytotoxic and induce apoptosis in EGFR positive cancer cells as measured by the tetrazolium dye reduction, and Rhodamine 123 and JC‐10 mitochondrial depolarization assays. In addition, exchange of the ToxA REDLK endoplasmic reticulum retention signal for KDEL and co‐expression of the ColE3 lysis protein resulted in an overall increased cytotoxicity compared to the wild type toxin. This approach has the potential to significantly enhance the antitumor activity of VNP20009 while maintaining its previously established safety profile. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2016;113: 2698–2711. © 2016 The Authors. Biotechnology and Bioengineering published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

A protocol to transfer a fed-batch platform process into semi-perfusion mode: The benefit of automated small-scale bioreactors compared to shake flasks as scale-down model

Continuous processes such as perfusion processes can offer advantages compared to fed-batch or batch processes in bio-processing: improved product quality (e.g. for labile products), increased product yield, and cost savings. In this work, a semi-perfusion process was established in shake flasks and transferred to an automated small-scale bioreactor by daily media exchange via centrifugation based on an existing fed-batch process platform. At first the development of a suitable medium and feed composition, the glucose concentration required by the cells and the cell-specific perfusion rate were investigated in shake flasks as the conventional scale-down system. This lead to an optimized process with a threefold higher titer of 10 g/L monoclonal antibody compared to the standard fed-batch. To proof the suitability and benefit as a small-scale model, the established semi-perfusion process was transferred to an automated small-scale bioreactor with improved pH and dissolved oxygen control. The average specific productivity improved from 24.16 pg/(c*d) in the fed-batch process and 36.04 pg/c*d in the semi-perfusion shake flask to 38.88 pg/(c*d) in the semi-perfusion process performed in the controlled small-scale bioreactor, thus illustrating the benefits resulting from the applied semi-perfusion approach, especially in combination with controlled DO and pH settings. © 2019 The Authors. Biotechnology Progress published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of American Institute of Chemical Engineers Biotechnol. Prog., 35: e2757, 2019.     

Mitochondria and Aging

Cover illustration: Mitochondria and Aging, a special issue edited by Professor Heinz D. Osiewacz (Frankfurt, Germany), devoted to aging research and the involvement of mitochondria “from models to humans”. Depicted are a 3D section of a human cell with mitochondria shown in red (© NIH, see http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/handbook/illustrations/cellmitochondria) and from top to bottom: micrograph of mitochondria from the model organism Podospora anserina (© C. Scheckhuber, see p. 781), hand with pill (© Photodisc Inc.) and the worm Caenorhabditis elegans with typical senescent morphology (© B. Braeckman, see p. 803).