Our societal issue

Anemia is an abnormal decrease in the hemoglobin level in the blood. The threshold value below which we speak of anemia varies according to age and sex. There are many causes of anemia, but iron deficiency is the most common. Anemia causes different symptoms depending on its severity (paleness, fatigue, shortness of breath, etc.). Anemia is a real global public health problem that affects young children and pregnant women in particular. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that 42% of children under the age of five and 40% of pregnant women worldwide are anemic.

Moreover, food production capacity is not the same around the globe, and we already dedicate 38% of the world's land to agriculture. Today's food system is a notorious contributor to environmental problems and economic inequality and is highly inefficient given the significant amount of food that is wasted.

The use of new and innovative food sources is, therefore, a crucial issue to preserve food systems. These new food sources will need to meet a high nutritional standard, while reducing their impact on the environment.

Our chassis

Chlamydomonas reinhardtii is a photosynthetic green microalgae that has been massively studied and used as a model organism in plant biology. Its physiology and metabolism are well known, and both its nuclear and chloroplast genomes have been sequenced in 2007. Since Chlamydomonas reinhardtii is very well known and rather easy to modify genetically, it is an ideal chassis for synthetic biology.

Our project

Our team offers NAWI: New Algae for World Improvements. This project is based on a green microalga, in order to create a new food source that meets both nutritional needs, while being associated with an environmentally friendly production system. The axis of nutritional needs is focusing on iron in order to respond deficiencies in two major situations: malnutrition and the change of diets towards a conscious vegetarianism, that can lead to the development of anemia, in order to preserve the environment.
‍
The project is therefore focused on the controlled expression of the THB1 (truncated hemoglobin 1) of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, that binds the iron. The heme iron is the best absorbed in the gut. In order to control and improve its expression, our team worked on the development of insulator sequences compatible with the MoClo kit, cloning tool for Chlamydomonas. These sequences isolate genes from the genomic context. The THB1 transgene is therefore transformed with an inducible promoter, and the most known insulator sequences (gypsy) from Drosophilia associated with the gene of the protein essential to the mechanism (Su(Hw)). The production of this GMO must be sustainable in order to emancipate itself from polluting and soil-destroying agriculture. It is therefore based on the use of bioreactors in optimized nutrient environments to ensure the growth of algae. The final objective would be to introduce in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii a metabolic pathway to use waste as a source of carbon, in order to integrate the production of a completely sustainable and autonomous process.