Summer 2022 Internship
Role: Intern, Fermentation
As a member of the Fermentation team, my responsibilities included preparation and operation, and data collection of fermentations in support of research, development, and production activities. Tasks included bioreactor assembly and sterilization, media preparation, preparation of starter cultures and performing lab assays to collect data on microbial growth, total protein content, carbohydrate consumption, and trace nutrient concentration.
Special Project
Bioherbicides
Supported a project team investigating novel microbes for commercialization as a bioherbicide product. Performed microassays in Biolector Pro (picture below) to identify optimal media and fermentation conditions that yield microbes with herbicidal activity. As a result of my work, we elucidated strains and their ideal growth conditions that exhibit herbicidal activity as determined in greenhouse testing (bottom left picture)
Special Project
BioIntelligence
Developed predictive models using BioIntelligence AI tool (pictured at right) to use in the operation of production fermentation runs. Models were used to predict real-time fermentation parameters such as glucose consumption, total protein content, microbial growth, and sporulation. This work resulted in predictive models that could be applied to optimize full-scale production runs by signaling when a fermentation can be halted to harvest end products.
About AgBiome
AgBiome is an ag-biotech company founded in 2012 in Research-Triangle Park, NC that specializes in the production of microbe-based crop protectants. Their stated goal is to use microbial communities to create products that benefit humans and their environment by discovering, developing, and producing biological products for crop protection. Using a proprietary platform, AgBiome screens thousands of microbes for genes and traits to identify novel uses for biological products, yielding such products as Howler, Theia, and Ensendo.​
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