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Further Additional Biology > Topic 3 - Biotechnology > Flashcards

Topic 3 - Biotechnology Flashcards

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1
Q

What is biotechnology?

A
  • Using live organisms (especially microorganisms) to provide useful products or people with services
  • The alteration of natural molecules using science + engineering to provide goods + services
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2
Q

What is a fermenter?

A
  • Large vessels used to cultivate (grow) microorganisms for the production of biomolecules on a large scale
  • Provide the perfect conditions for microorganisms (and their enzymes) to work
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3
Q

What conditions need to be controlled in a fermenter?

A
  • Temperature (at optimum)
  • Oxygenation (no anaerobic as more products)
  • pH
  • Agitation (keeping the mixture moving)
  • Aseptic precautions
  • Nutrients (for enzymes to keep them working)
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4
Q

Why are conditions controlled in a fermenter?

A

To produce as much yield as possible

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5
Q

How and why are aseptic conditions maintained in a fermenter?

A
  • Everything sterilised including fermenter
  • Done by high pressure steam
  • Stop other microbes growing: may decrease yield/alter products
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6
Q

How and why are the nutrients levels maintained in a fermenter?

A
  • Provided in liquid culture medium
  • Microorganisms need carbohydrates (sugars for respiration) + nitrates (to make proteins for growth) + vitamins + minerals
  • More nutrients can be pumped in if needed
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7
Q

How and why is the optimum temperature maintained in a fermenter?

A

-Enzymes in microbes work as fast as possible without denaturing
-Too cold: rate of growth decreases (enzymes less near optimum)
Too hot: enzyme denatures
-Microorganisms produce heat by respiration so fermenters must be cooled
-Usually done with water jacket which cold water is pumped through

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8
Q

How and why are oxygen levels maintained in a fermenter?

A

-Sterile air bubbled through to microorganisms for aerobic respiration (if needed)

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9
Q

How and why is agitation done in a fermenter?

A
  • Motorised stirrer

- Keeps culture well mixed, so microorganisms get enough oxygen + nutrients

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10
Q

How could you investigate the effect of temperature on yeast growth?

A
  • Boil water through test tube (get rid of any dissolved oxygen)
  • When cooled, dissolve small amount of sugar + yeast in water
  • Add layer of paraffin to keep oxygen out
  • Attach bung with tube leading to 2nd test tube of limewater
  • Limewater in 2nd test tube to check if CO2 given off (go cloudy)
  • Count bubbles produced in certain amount of time to measure rate of CO2 production
  • Compare rates of CO2 under different conditions to see growth of yeast
  • Put test tubes in water baths at different temps (yeast grows quickest at 37°C; grows slower at lower temps + killed at temps >48°C)
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11
Q

How could you investigate the effect of pH on yeast growth?

A
  • Boil water through test tube (get rid of any dissolved oxygen)
  • When cooled, dissolve small amount of sugar + yeast in water
  • Add layer of paraffin to keep oxygen out
  • Attach bung with tube leading to 2nd test tube of limewater
  • Limewater I’m 2nd test tube to check if CO2 given off (go cloudy)
  • Count bubbles produced in certain amount of time to measure rate of CO2 production
  • Compare rates of CO2 under different conditions to see growth of yeast
  • Vary pH of solution (yeast grows best in slightly acidic conditions; 4-4.5)
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12
Q

How could you investigate the effect of sugar concentration on yeast growth?

A
  • Boil water through test tube (get rid of any dissolved oxygen)
  • When cooled, dissolve small amount of sugar + yeast in water
  • Add layer of paraffin to keep oxygen out
  • Attach bung with tube leading to 2nd test tube of limewater
  • Limewater I’m 2nd test tube to check if CO2 given off (go cloudy)
  • Count bubbles produced in certain amount of time to measure rate of CO2 production
  • Compare rates of CO2 under different conditions to see growth of yeast
  • Vary sugar concentration (more sugar available as energy source, faster yeast grows)
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13
Q

What organism is mycoprotein made from?

A

Fungus (Fusarium)

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14
Q

What is mycoprotein used to make?

A

Used to make meat substitutes for vegetarian meals e.g. Quorn

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15
Q

How is mycoprotein formed?

A
  • Fungus Fusarium grown in fermenters using glucose syrup as food
  • Fungus respites aerobically so needs oxygen supply
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16
Q

What are the health benefits of using mycoprotein over meat?

A
  • More protein + fibre

- Less saturated fat; better for the heart

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17
Q

What is fermentation?

A

When microorganisms break down sugars to release energy, usually by anaerobic respiration

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18
Q

How is bacteria used to ferment milk to produce yoghurt?

A
  • Equipment sterilised to remove unwanted microorganisms
  • Milk is pasteurised then cooled
  • Starter culture of Lactobacillus bacteria added + mixture incubated (heated to about 40°C) in a fermenter
  • Bacteria ferment lactose sugar in milk to form lactic acid which causes milk to clot + solidify into yoghurt
  • Flavours/colours sometimes added + yoghurt packaged
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19
Q

How could you investigate the effect of temperature in yoghurt productions?

A

-Add 25cm3 of milk to 5 sterile boiling tubes. Pasteurise then cool milk
-Add 1cm3 of yoghurt culture (Lactobacillus bacteria) to each boiling tube + stir gently
-Incubate tubes for 5 hours at 5 different temps (20-60°C)
-Measure pH after 5 hours to see success of yoghurt production:
+As yoghurt made, pH decreases from 7-4 from lactic acid produced. (Reaction slows at around 4 as bacteria are sensitive to acidic conditions)
+pH should be 4 for tube incubated at 40°C as best temp for optimum growth of bacteria
+pH should be higher at lower temps than 40°C as growth rate is slower
+pH should stay at 7 at higher temps as kill bacteria, so no yoghurt
-Can look at effect of different variable on yeast growth, but keep other variables same

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20
Q

What are the advantages of using microorganisms for food production?

A
  • Microorganisms e.g fungi/bacteria can grow quickly
  • Easy to look after: only need something to grow them in, food, oxygen, right temp
  • Can be produced in all climates if you have right equipment. Many places unsuitable for farming crops/animals
  • can use waste products from agriculture/industry as food for their life processes
  • Making it cheaper than other methods
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21
Q

How are enzymes used in biological washing powders?

A

-Soluble chemical stains wash out w/ water, insoluble chemical (starch, protein, fat) stains don’t
-Non bio. washing powders (detergents) have chemicals that break up stains on clothes
-Bio wp have same chems as non bio, but have enzymes to break down certain stains:
•carbohydrates (jam, choc) broken down by amylases to produce simple sugars
•lipids (fats) (butter, oil) broken down by lipases to produce fatty acids + glycerol
•proteins (blood, grass) broken down by proteases to produce amino acids
-Bio wp more effective at low temps than non bio
-Enzymes: work best at pH 7, same as tap water; in areas of hard water: may be alkaline (damaging enzymes)
-Can buy special stain removers: some special solvents but some have specific enzymes to break down stain

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22
Q

What enzyme breaks down carbohydrate?

A

Amylase

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23
Q

What enzyme breaks down lipids?

A

Lipase

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24
Q

What enzyme breaks down protein?

A

Protease

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25
Q

When amylase breaks down carbohydrates, what are the products?

A

Simple sugars

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26
Q

When lipase breaks down lipids, what are the products?

A

Fatty acids + glycerol

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27
Q

When protease breaks down protein, what are the products?

A

Amino acids

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28
Q

How are enzymes used to make cheese?

A
  • Cheese made from substance: rennet
  • Rennet from lining of calf’s stomach. Contains enzyme: chymosin, that clots milk
  • Vegetarians don’t want it as made from rennet from animals
  • Genes for chymosin isolated from calf stomach + put to yeast cells. Grown on industrial scale producing chymosin
29
Q

How are enzymes used to make sweets?

A
  • Enzyme invertase (sucrase): converts sucrose (a sugar) to glucose + fructose (different sugar), that’s sweeter. Less sugar needed for same sweetness
  • Manufacturers save money + produce lower calorie sweet foods
  • Invertase naturally produced by yeast called Saccharomyces cerevisiae
30
Q

What is the name of the yeast that naturally produces invertase?

A

Saccharomyces cerevisiae

31
Q

Why are enzymes immobilised?

A
  • When enzymes used to speed up reactions, dissolve in mixture w/ substrates + products. Can be hard to remove
  • Many industrial processes: use immobilised enzymes: don’t need separating from mixture when reaction has taken place
  • Immobilised enzymes attached to insoluble material e.g. fibre. OR. Encapsulated in alginate (gel-like substance).
  • Insoluble material w/ attached enzyme can be washed + reused
32
Q

What foods is the sugar lactose naturally found in?

A

Milk (and yoghurt)

33
Q

What enzyme breaks down lactose and what are the products?

A
  • Enzyme lactase

- Produces glucose + galactose (absorbed into the blood)

34
Q

What happens if someone lacks the enzyme lactase?

A
  • Lactose from milk not broken down
  • Gut bacteria feed on it
  • Causes abdominal pain, wind, diarrhoea
  • This is when someone is lactose intolerant
35
Q

What does it mean if someone is lactose intolerant?

A

Can not break down the lactose from milks (not enough lactase enzyme)

36
Q

What are the main steps in producing lactose free milk?

A
  • Immobilising the lactase
  • Setting up a column of immobilised lactase
  • Making the lactose-free milk
37
Q

How do you immobilise the lactase (for the production of lactose free milk)?

A
  • Mix sodium alginate + lactase in syringe
  • Add mixture 1 drop at a time to beaker of calcium chloride
  • Beads should form (lactase immobilised in beads). Leave them to harden for few mins, then use tea strainer to separate them from calcium chloride solution
38
Q

How do you set up the column of immobilised lactase (for the production of lactose free milk)?

A
  • Put some nylon gauze in syringe + attach tap at end

- Add beads made to syringe

39
Q

Using the beads produced in syringe, how do you make lactose free milk?

A
  • Use glucose test strip to see if any glucose in beaker of milk
  • Slowly add milk to syringe. Collect treated milk in small beaker
  • Test glucose content of treated milk + compare to untreated milk

(Should find before test strip won’t change colour [no glucose in milk] but in treated milk will [lactose converted to glucose])

40
Q

How can pectinase be used to extract orange juice?

A
  • Pectinase breaks down pectin (part of cell wall in apples + oranges)
  • Chop apple to small chunks + divide into 2 beakers
  • Add pectinase solution to 1 beaker + add same vol of water to other then stir
  • Incubate beakers in water bath at 40°C for about 15 mins
  • Filter contents of both beakers + record vol of juice from each
  • Should get more juice from beaker w/ pectinase than water
41
Q

What is genetic engineering?

A

Cutting out a useful gene from one organism and putting it into another

42
Q

How can bacteria be engineered to produce human insulin?

A
  • Plasmid (DNA) removed from bacterium
  • Insulin gene cut from human chromosome w/ restriction enzyme (recognise specific sequences of DNA + cut it at these points. Cut leaves one of the DNA strands with unpaired bases, called a ‘sticky end’
  • Plasmid cut open using same restriction enzyme leaving same sticky ends
  • Plasmid + human insulin gene mixed together
  • Ligase (enzyme) added, joining sticky ends together to produce recombinant DNA (2 different bits of DNA stuck together)
  • Recombinant DNA inserted into bacterium
  • Modified bacterium grown in a fermenter. End up w/ millions of bacteria producing insulin for people with diabetes
  • Bacteria that contain gene for human insulin are transgenic
43
Q

What does transgenic mean?

A

When it has a gene transferred from another species

44
Q

How can agrobacterium tumefaciens be used to genetically modify plants?

A
  • Agrobacterium tumefaciens is a pathogen: invades plant cells + inserts genes into plant’s DNA
  • If other genes added to bacterium, they’re carried too
  • Acts as a vector
45
Q

What is a vector?

A

A carrier used to insert DNA into other organisms

46
Q

How would you make herbicide resistant plants?

A

1) Get plant already resistant to herbicide + find gene responsible for this
2) Cut out this gene from one of the plant’s cells
3) Agrobacterium tumefaciens bacteria contain a circular loop of DNA; remove this from a bacterium, cut open + insert herbicide resistant gene
4) Allow GMed Agrobacterium tumefaciens to infect cells of target plant
5) Bacteria will insert their genes into plant’s DNA (incl. herbicide resistant gene)
6) These cells then grown in a medium containing herbicide. Those that grow must have herbicide resistant gene

47
Q

How can crops be genetically modified to be resistant to insects?

A
  • Bacterium called Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) that produces toxin (poison) that kills many insect larvae that are harmful to crops
  • Gene for Bt toxin inserted into crops (e.g. corn, cotton) so toxin produced in stem + leaves so resistant to insect pests
  • Toxin is specific to insect pests (harmless to humans, animals + other insects) but long term effects of Bt crops exposure aren’t known
48
Q

What is the potential problem of using Bt crops?

A
  • Insects that feed on the plant constantly exposed to toxin so may develop resistance + no longer killed by it
  • Farmers try to avoid through use of other insecticides too
49
Q

What are the advantages of biotechnology to genetically modify plants?

A
  • Crops GEed resistant to pests = better crop yields
  • GEed grow better in drought conditions = better crop yields
  • GEed to combat deficiency diseases (e.g. Golden Rice GEed to produce chemical converted in body to Vit A)
50
Q

What are the disadvantages of biotechnology to genetically modify plants?

A
  • Hunger from not affording food, not that there’s no food so poverty should be tackled 1st
  • Fear countries become dependent on companies selling GM seeds
  • Poor soil = main reason crops fail, even GM crops won’t survive
51
Q

How have scientists genetically modified purple tomatoes?

A
  • Snapdragon flowers contain type of flavonoid (molecules found in plants that have antioxidant effects, thought to help protect against cancer + heart disease)
  • GEed purple tomatoes so have flavonoid gene from snapdragon (flavonoid turns them purple)
  • Purple tomatoes developed as easy way to get antioxidants to those in developed countries who don’t each enough fruit + veg
52
Q

What are the problems with the genetic modification of purple tomatoes?

A
  • Flavonoid may slightly change tomatoes flavour
  • Some worry of long term effects of GM crops (e.g. effect on farm’s biodiversity, whether transplanted genes will get out into other plants)
53
Q

What is food security?

A
  • World’s population increasing
  • Global food production must increase so everyone has enough food with right balance of nutrition (this is food security)
  • As world’s population increases need to grow more food so each person has same amount to eat?
54
Q

According to the United Nations World Food Programme, how many undernourished people were there in 2000-02?

A
  • 852 million

- 815 million from developing countries

55
Q

What ways can you increase food production?

A
  • Reducing pest numbers
  • Selective breeding programmes
  • GM plants
56
Q

How can you reduce pest numbers to increase food production?

A
  • Killing insects = crops grow larger = greater productivity
  • Use insecticides (kills insect pests that eat/damage crops)
  • Plants GMed to produce toxins to kill pests (Bt toxin)
  • Crop rotation (stops pests that affect one crop type building up in an area)
  • Biological control (using living things to control pests [not chems], e.g. alphids are pests as eat veg, ladybirds = alphid predators so released in fields to keep down alphid nos.)
57
Q

What is crop rotation?

A

Growing a cycle of different crops in a field each year

58
Q

How can you use selective breeding programmes to increase food production?

A
  • Parent plants w/ best characteristics selected (e.g. wheat plants w/ high wheat yield)
  • Breed together
  • Best of offspring selected + bred
  • Process repeated over several generations to develop desired traits (e.g. produce plant w/ very high yield of wheat)
59
Q

What is selective breeding?

A

When humans select the best plants according to what we want from them

60
Q

What are biofuels?

A

Fuels made from biomass (plants, animals + their waste products)

61
Q

What is biogas?

A
  • Microorganisms decompose waste materials/plants to produce biogas
  • Usually 70% methane + 30% CO2
62
Q

What can biogas be used for?

A
  • Can be burned to power turbine (to generate electricity) or heat water + produce steam to heat central heating systems
  • Used as fuel for cars + buses
63
Q

What is biodiesel?

A

Fuel made from vegetable oils, animal fats or waste cooking oil

64
Q

What can biodiesel be used for?

A

Alternative to regular diesel in vehicles (+ = don’t really need to alter vehicle much to run biodiesel)

65
Q

What are three examples of biofuels?

A
  • Biogas
  • Biodiesel
  • Ethanol
66
Q

What is ethanol?

A
  • Produced by using yeast to ferment glucose. Materials e.g. sugar cane, corn + barley can be used as source of glucose in ethanol production
  • Can be burnt as a fuel; cleaner fuel than petrol/diesel (produces fewer pollutants)
67
Q

What can ethanol be used for?

A
  • Can be used as a fuel

- Cars can be adapted to run on mixture of ethanol + petrol, gasohol

68
Q

What are the advantages of using biofuels over fossil fuels?

A
  • Sustainable, plants to make biofuels can be replaced quickly w/ new crops so renewable; finite supply of ff like coal + crude oil, run out
  • Plant to make biofuels photosynthesise, removing CO2 from atmosphere, balancing out CO2 released when burnt (carbon neutral); biofuels don’t release as much CO2 as ff; CO2 is a greenhouse gas so contributes to global waming
  • Biofuels fairly clean; burning ff produces particulates (which can cause lung disease); burning biofules produces less particulates
  • Biofuels don’t produce much sulphur dioxide (cause of acid rain); SO2 produces when ff burnt in power stations
69
Q

What are the disadvantages of using biofuels over fossil fuels?

A
  • Growing crops to make biofuels takes up lots of land so less for crops for food; problem as need to feed more people (food security)
  • Time + money to adapt vehicles + power station to run on biofuels

Further Additional Biology (3 decks)

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