The National Science Foundation has announced a $22 million grant to establish a “BioFoundry” laboratory to study extreme microorganisms in collaboration with UC Riverside, UC Santa Barbara and Cal Poly Pomona.

The BioFoundry for Extreme and Exceptional Fungi, Archaea, and Bacteria (ExFAB) will focus on developing techniques to learn from nature’s more unusual microorganisms. These microbes are considered “extreme” because they have unusual nutritional requirements, grow at extremely high or low temperatures, or grow without oxygen – characteristics that make them difficult to study with existing laboratory equipment.

Researchers at the three institutions hope to exploit their extraordinary properties for applications ranging from the biosynthesis of fuels and other products to the bioremediation of polluted waters and soils. The ExFAB lab will also advance scientific knowledge of the “rules of life” by revealing how these organisms can thrive in some of the most extreme environments on Earth.

“ExFAB offers an exciting opportunity to open synthetic biology to the enormous diversity of microbes that nature provides,” said ExFAB co-director Ian Wheeldon, professor of chemical and environmental engineering in UCR’s Marlan and Rosemary Bourns College of Engineering, and an expert in synthetic biology and the engineering of unconventional microbes.

“The current focus of synthetic biology is on developing new approaches to manipulate a small number of commonly used microbes,” said Wheeldon. “This facility will dramatically expand that approach by enabling synthetic biology on all microbes.”

UCR’s facility is scheduled to begin operations early next year. It will be located in Bourns Hall on UCR’s main campus, will be about 1,500 square feet in size, and will employ four people, Wheeldon said.

Research bottlenecks in the new facility will be eliminated through automated fluid handling, novel robotic workflows, machine learning-based technology and novel instrumentation, Wheeldon said. For example, a researcher who needs to know how 100 microbial species grow under 10 different environmental conditions would no longer have to perform 1,000 different, laborious experiments thanks to the automated processes at ExFAB.

In just one example, the lab is expected to advance research by Yujie Men, an associate professor at UCR. He has identified species of bacteria that can destroy certain “forever chemicals,” which are water pollutants that have stubbornly strong carbon-fluorine bonds that allow them to persist in the environment for decades. Such bacteria are needed for the cost-effective cleaning of contaminated groundwater resources used by drinking water utilities across the country.

“This cutting-edge interface between technology and life sciences is tremendously important,” said Christoper S. Lynch, dean of the Bourns College of Engineering. “It opens new opportunities for discoveries and breakthroughs and provides new facilities for sophisticated experimental work. This collaboration with UC Santa Barbara and Cal Poly Pomona will help each of our respective university systems share resources, expand our research footprint, and amplify the impact of our breakthroughs and innovations.”

ExFAB will also establish educational programs to attract and train future biotechnology employees from the UC and Cal State systems, including a 10-week research internship program for Cal State master’s students at UCSB or UCR. ExFAB will also provide summer training for researchers who will use the lab.

“We are extremely excited because this funding will allow us to build an infrastructure that no one, especially in academia, has had access to before,” said Michelle O’Malley, professor of chemical and biological engineering at UCSB and co-director of ExFAB.”