Turning Point
Our journey throughout this project wasn’t all that smooth. Many a times we came across a few obstacles which we had to overcome and there were a few occasions the team had those eureka moments which brought about changes in the course of direction we were heading.
Product selection
One of the first requirement as part of the Nutriplus company was to come up with a new nutratraceutical product produced by a bioprocess. After much deliberation the team decided to collaborate two ideas of reusing food waste and bioactive compounds for treating disease. Originally the team just automatically start looking at fruit & veg waste because they are known for their rich bioactive compound content. However after more in depth literature review we came to realize that there are a lot of existent studies already on recovering bioactive compounds from food waste and so we wanted to be more original so we decided focusing on one particular bioactive compound rather than them as a whole in general would be the best approach. Again much invested hours of going through endless amount of literature bioactive peptides came to light as the upcoming next best thing for potential application in the pharmaceutical sector due there diverse range of properties i.e. anti-aging, antimicrobial, antidiabetic, antithrombotic, antihypertensive, anticancer etc. It was at this moment in time the team changed the course of direction and decided our focus would be solely on these bioactive peptides as there is very little literature available in this area so it would be a more unique product to try produce rather than just looking at bioactive compounds as a whole which has been done by several researchers.
Change in food waste source
Deciding on the product wasn’t the only hiccup the team had, deciding where we would obtain these from was another story. We just were going to use all different types of wastes from households and industrial activities which produce high levels of food waste however the director of Nutriplus company recommended we narrow down our idea rather than keeping things so broad as it would make things easier in the long run when deciding on how to produce the desired peptides. This was a fair point and as you can imagine the team went to go ahead with the original idea of fruit and veg waste but after a couple of weeks research the team were still struggling to find any rich source of fruit or veg which these bioactive peptides could be adequately generated from. Soybeans, lentils and other beans & seeds seemed to be the best choice however ever even at that their peptide content wasn’t satisfactory enough.
One of the team members came across a paper which look at extraction of bioactive peptides from meat waste from which several peptides were recovered. We delved more into this idea and found meat is among the richest source of protein out of the food groups along with the dairy group. A lot of studies were already conducted in recovering peptides from milk and other dairy sources so we steered clear of this as we wanted to be more innovative and original. Exploring meat waste for generation of bioactive peptides was found to be an area not readily looked at. From literature we came to learn that meat waste is highly costly to dispose of and the food industry are seeking more efficient ways to use it to decrease the bioburden of meat waste and so we had the solution – reusing it for generation of bioactive peptides for medicinal application. It was at this moment in time we realized there was a gap in the market for this and the original idea of using all forms of food waste and fruit & veg waste were discarded of.
(Qatar, 2017)
Cell line & process
Memo 11 required the team to choose an appropriate cell line to produce the chosen product. Prior to the class covering cells the team were already one step ahead and had their eye set on using Aspergiullus niger a fungi, which would undergo a microbial fermentation step to get it to release the enzyme glucoamylase which is a carbohydrate breaking enzyme. Our reason for this was because at the time the team were still planning on using fruit & veg waste for sourcing the peptides and after doing some literature research we found a higher bioactive peptide yield could be achieved by using a carbohydrate enzyme to break down the cellulose within plant cell walls for release of more proteins for recovery if peptides. However as outlined in the previous turning point, the team switched from using fruit & veg waste to meat waste and so this sparked a turning point in the choice of cell line. Bioactive peptides are inactive in their parent protein and so require to be released by means of microbial fermentation or enzyme hydrolysis. After the class about cell and cell lines and learning about the pros and cons of the different classifications of cells the team came to the conclusion that generating the peptides via enzyme hydrolysis would be the better option as we could directly use a protease enzyme for hydrolysis rather than first growing a cell to try get it to release the enzyme and then use the enzyme to perform a hydrolysis step, in a way we were kind of leap frogging and taking the quicker route for peptide production. We weren’t confidently sure that an enzyme hydrolysis step could be used instead of fermentation as the lecturers notes just focused on fermentation and so we had to verify this idea with him which got the go ahead in the end and so the original cell line idea was discarded.
(PMG Biology, 2014)
Disease looking to treat
Another turning point experienced by the team was in relation to the choice of a disease to treat. Aforementioned, bioactive peptides have a diverse range of properties – anticancer, antidiabetic, antihypertensive, antimicrobial - which make them viable to treat several diseases however we couldn’t treat them all as much as we would want to we had to narrow it down to one. One of the group members at the time was currently working on the antimicrobial properties of bioactive compounds for their activity against food borne pathogens and potential in reducing the occurrence of food related illness for their thesis.
(CuriousHalt, 2017)
This led to the idea that we could use bioactive peptides with antimicrobial properties for treatment of bacterial infections. The team looked further into this but was struggling to come to terms with how this would be achieved and bacterial infections wasn’t that much of a big problem and so the team looked at other diseases which we could use these peptides to treat. Hypertension & heart disease has a long history in one of the group members family from which many have complained about the headaches and ill feeling they are left with after taking their medication with one member switching to different tablets on a few occasions to try get a type which couldn’t leave her feeling worse off. This opened up a window of opportunity for the team. After further looking into current hypertensive drugs on the market it was found that nearly all had negative side effects associated with them and the pharmaceutical sector are currently seeking more natural treatments for hypertension. With that the idea of using bioactive
peptides for treatment of bacterial infections was abolished and instead the idea of recovering bioactive peptides with antihypertensive properties from meat waste for treatment of hypertension was born and was set and stone from this point on.
References
CuriousHalt. (2017, September). Evolution of disease in the world. Retrieved December 17, 2017, from CuriousHalt: https://www.curioushalt.com/evolution-diseases-world/
PMG Biology. (2014). Enzymes: A* understanding for iGCSE Biology 2.8 2.9 2.10. Retrieved Decmeber 16, 2017, from PMG
Biology: https://pmgbiology.com/2014/12/03/enzymes-a-understanding-for-igcse-biology/
Qatar. (2017). Food waste in Quatar. Retrieved December 17, 2017, from Quatar Living: http://www.qatarliving.com/forum/welcome-qatar/posts/watch-food-wastage-qatar