Removing Nitrogen-based Greenhouse Gases with Novel Metalloenzymes
2025 Faculty Research Award
AWARD PERIOD: 2026-2028
Nitrous oxide (N₂O) is a greenhouse gas roughly 300 times more potent than CO₂ over a 100-year timespan. Wastewater treatment plants produce this gas as a byproduct of microbial processes during nitrogen removal, a process known as denitrification. Mohammad Seyedsayamdost, Professor of Chemistry and Molecular Biology, and Xinning Zhang, Associate Professor of Geosciences and HMEI are studying a newly discovered microbial enzyme, nitric oxide dismutase (NOD), which “shortcuts” traditional denitrification by converting nitric oxide (NO, the direct N₂O precursor) straight into harmless N₂ and O₂. The team will express, purify, and analyze NOD at the molecular level, then test how NOD-producing Desulfobacillus bacteria perform in wastewater bioreactors and reduce N₂O emissions. By bridging mechanistic enzymology with environmental microbiology, the project seeks to reveal new biochemical pathways that could be harnessed for next-generation biotechnologies to reduce N₂O emissions from engineered nitrogen-cycling systems.
Participating Departments
- Department of Chemistry
- Department of Molecular Biology
- Department of Geosciences
- High Meadows Environmental Institute (HMEI)
Faculty
