“Renewable, bio-based transportation fuels are dominated by production of bioethanol (in US and Brazil) and biodiesel (in Europe). The UK is lagging behind international biofuel developments, especially with regard to production of fuel alcohols (ethanol and butanol) from sustainable feedstocks such as lignocellulose. This conference will assess key scientific and technological challanges in developing biofuels of the future. Leading researchers and industrialists will discuss these issues within the context of the current and emerging UK biofuel sector followed by an open forum question and answer session”. Meeting chair: Emo van Halsema, Halotec Instruments BV, The Netherlands

This event has CPD accreditation and will have a troubleshooting panel session.

On registration you will be able to submit your questions to the panel that will be asked by the chair on the day of the event

“Renewable, bio-based transportation fuels are dominated by production of bioethanol (in US and Brazil) and biodiesel (in Europe). The UK is lagging behind international biofuel developments, especially with regard to production of fuel alcohols (ethanol and butanol) from sustainable feedstocks such as lignocellulose. This conference will assess key scientific and technological challanges in developing biofuels of the future. Leading researchers and industrialists will discuss these issues within the context of the current and emerging UK biofuel sector followed by an open forum question and answer session”. Meeting chair: Emo van Halsema, Halotec Instruments BV, The Netherlands

This event has CPD accreditation and will have a troubleshooting panel session.

On registration you will be able to submit your questions to the panel that will be asked by the chair on the day of the event

9:00 – 9:45 Registration

9:45 – 10:00 Introduction by the Chair: : Emo van Halsema, Halotec Instruments BV, The Netherlands

10:00 – 10:30 Advance Microwave Technologies for Renewable Energies

Professor Ahmed Al-Shamma’a
Director of Environmental, Sustainability and Renewable Energy Research Centre, Liverpool John Moores University, UK

10:30 – 11:00 The Algal Biofuels Challenge.

Dr John Love, University of Exeter , UK

Algae are almost ten-times more productive than land plants, do not compete with crops for arable land and, paradoxically, often require less water per unit biomass than do land plants. Algal biomass production is therefore a valid option for a sustainable, green industry involved in CO2 mitigation and/or the production of vitamins, high quality biochemicals, protein and biofuel. This presentation will give an overview of the fundamental research performed in my laboratory to understand and improve the opportunities for large-scale algal-based biomass production.

11:00 – 11:10 Speakers’ photo

11:10 – 11:30 Mid-morning break and poster presentations

11:30 – 12:00 Engineering yeast for second-generation bioethanol production

Dr Paul Klaassen, DSM Biotechnology Center¸The Netherlands

12:00 – 12:30 Sustainable biobutanol

Professor Martin Tangney, Director Biofuel Research Centre, Edinburgh Napier University, UK

12:30–13:30 Lunch

13:30 – 14:30 Question and Answer Session

Delegates will be asked to submit questions to a panel of experts. Questions can be submitted before the event or on the day

14:30 – 15:00 Using Dielectric Spectroscopy to monitor in real time the concentration of micro-organisms and the enzymic conversion of biomass.

John Carvell, Aber Instruments Ltd., Abersytwyth, UK

In the optimization of a new process for production of biofuel from ‘second generation’ lignocellulosic crops, it is essential to maximise utilisation of the full range of sugars for fermentation to ethanol. This will be achieved by using an appropriate combination of pre-treatments, enzymes and ethanol producing micro-organsims. Fermentation conditions will also have to be optimised to maximise ethanol production from the feedstock both at laboratory and pilot scale.

In this paper we look at the use of an on-line probe based on dielectric spectroscopy for monitoring the pretreatment and fermentation phases of the process in real time. The dielectric spectroscopy probe measures the capacitance of cell suspensions subjected to low radio frequencies (0.3-0.8 MHz), which is a function of the live cell biovolume. Cells with ruptured cell membranes are not detected by the probe. The technology is already well established in traditional bio-processing for monitoring the viable cell concentration and is widely used in brewing for the controlling the amount of live yeast to add at the start of each of fermentation. It is also widely used to monitor yeast, bacteria, plant and animal cell fermentations. We show some examples of how the dielectric spectroscopy probe has been used to monitor the concentration of live yeast during a lignocellulosic fermentation.

For feedstocks with a high loading of biomass suspended solids the capacitance generated by the plant based material can dominate the signal if it has not been through a rigorous hydrolysis process such as steam explosion. We show how probe can then be used to monitor the changes in the biomass as it is broken down during enzymatic hydrolysis and fermentation. In this case, the capacitance of the cells decreases in time as the plant cells get digested. The cell membranes, which are usually an excellent electrical insulator, start to become leaky and conduct electrical current. This current path effectively shorts out the membrane capacitance and results in a reduced capacitance signal.

We propose that dielectric spectroscopy can be used in certain situations to monitor the rate of enzymic conversion of the biomass and could be used for selecting the optimal dose rate, time and source of enzyme, particularly when there is a large variability in the quality and composition of the feedstock.

15:00 – 15:30 Afternoon Tea/Coffee and poster presentations

15:30 – 16:00 Talk title to be confirmed

Dr David Bryant, Aberystwyth University¸UK

16:00 – 16:30 Biohydrogen: for when tomorrow never comes

Professor Frank Sargent, University of Dundee, UK

Hydrogen gas is among a basket of possible solutions for future energy needs. At present 99% of hydrogen is produced by reforming fossil fuels and most is used directly as a feedstock by the chemical industry, but increasingly it is being used as a fuel. Hydrogen has the highest energy per weight of any fuel, and its use (particularly in a fuel cell) is clean and efficient. ‘Biohydrogen’ is the production, or consumption, of molecular hydrogen by living organisms and hydrogen metabolism is central to the physiology of many microorganisms, including green algae, strict anaerobes, soil aerobes, and human pathogens such as Helicobacter and Salmonella. Many of these have the ability to produce, or ‘evolve’, hydrogen photosynthetically or fermentatively. Most importantly, biohydrogen offers the prospect of fully renewable hydrogen, freed from any dependence on fossil fuel.

Enteric bacteria (e.g. Escherichia coli) evolve hydrogen when cultured under fermentative conditions, i.e. with glucose and in the absence of oxygen. Equally, E. coli has become well established as a ‘chassis’ organism for biotechnologists interested in genetically modifying the cell’s metabolism, or even designing completely synthetic activities, for beneficial purposes. Hydrogenases are extremely active metalloenzymes responsible for the vast majority of microbial hydrogen evolution. The active sites of hydrogenases have been suggested to be as active as platinum in their hydrogen chemistry, and this has raised interest in their exploitation as actual or inspirational catalysts in electronic/fuel cell/sensor devices. E. coli naturally expresses three hydrogenase enzymes, each with distinct properties. Hydrogenase-3 is part of the poorly-understood formate hydrogenlyase (FHL) complex, which uses formic acid as a substrate to drive hydrogen evolution by this organism. The scope for tapping into this resource constructively is enormous. Moreover, understanding the way hydrogenases work, both at the atomic level and within living organisms, is an important factor in being able to design and build stable synthetic enzymes or microorganisms that may help bring about future, fully renewable, and healthy biohydrogen energy technologies.

16:30 – 17:00 Chairman’s summing up

Sponsored by

About the Speakers
Martin Tangney is an internationally recognised expert in carbohydrate utilisation and gene regulation in solventogenic clostridia. He has worked in a diversity of research environments, including industry in Denmark, government Research Institutes in France and Finland, and highly respected Universities in Germany, Ireland and the UK. He has published extensively in leading scientific journals as well as being an inventor on several patents. Professor Tangney has hosted numerous national and international scientific meetings and workshops, including the prestigious international conference on solventogenic clostridia Clostridium VIII held in Edinburgh in 2004; he will also host the next FEMS Council Delegates meeting in Sept 2008. Professor Tangney is a scientific advisor to the board of Green Biologics Ltd and he serves on the committees of Scottish Microbiology Society (as the meetings convenor) and. TechLink UK-Ireland. His current research focuses primarily on the microbial production of butanol as a second generation biofuel and he has numerous active research collaborations in this area with both industrial and academic groups funded by a variety of sources, including the BBSRC, EPSCR and both SME as well as large international industrial partners.

Frank Sargent was born in 1970 in the former coal-mining town of Kirkcaldy on the East coast of Scotland. In 1988 Frank embarked on a biochemistry degree at the University of Edinburgh, and then took up place in the University of Dundee’s graduate school in 1992. Frank’s PhD was under the supervision of David Boxer and focused on the molecular biology of hydrogenase enzymes in bacteria. In 1996 Frank took up a postdoctoral position at the John Innes Centre in Norwich. A second postdoc contract followed in 1998 at the University of East Anglia before Frank was lucky enough to win a University Research Fellowship from The Royal Society in 2000 in order to begin his own research group. Frank has pioneered studies of protein targeting and complex enzyme biosynthesis in bacteria and in recent times his team has increasingly focused on hydrogenases. The quality of Frank’s research was recognised by the award of The Fleming Prize from the Society of General Microbiology in 2006, The Colworth Medal from The Biochemical Society in 2007, the FEBS Young Group Leader Award in 2009, and The Wain Medal from the University of Kent in 2010.

John Love employs a multidisciplinary combination of molecular biology, cellular imaging, biochemistry and bioinformatics to investigate two main themes: The functional integration of molecular and cellular signalling pathways during photoperiodism in A. thaliana and the production of biofuels in planktonic algae and microbes. The research group currently has 10 Postdoctoral Research Associates, 3 Technicians and 6 PhD students and 1 MSc student. Our funding is from Industry, Research Councils, Government Organisations and Charitable Foundations.

Friday, 11 February 2011 09:00 - 17:00

The Institute
11 High Road
East Finchley
London
N2 8LL
United Kingdom
www.regonline.co.uk/Biofuels2011

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Tags: BIOETHANOL, BIOFUEL