Below is the text version for the “Webinar: AlgaePrize Office Hours” video, presented in February 2022 by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Bioenergy Technologies Office. Watch the video.
[Begin audio]
Erik Ringle, National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Well, again, good morning and good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to today's AlgaePrize competition office hours. I’m Erik Ringle from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. Before we get started today I’d like to cover a few housekeeping items so you know how you can participate today.
You will be in listen-only mode during the webinar. You can select audio connection options to listen to your computer audio or you can dial into your phone. For the best connection we do recommend calling in through a phone line. You may submit questions for our panelists today using the Q&A panel. If you are in full screen view right now click the question mark icon located on the floating toolbar at the lower right side of your screen. That will open that Q&A panel. If you are in split-screen mode, that Q&A panel is already open and is located at the lower right side of your screen. To submit your questions simply select all panelists in the Q&A drop-down menu, type in your question or comment, and press enter on your keyboard. You may send in those questions anytime during the presentations. We will collect these and time permitting address them during the Q&A session at the end of this webinar. Now if you have technical difficulties or need help during today's session, I want to direct your attention to the chat section. The chat section is different from the Q&A panel I just covered, and it appears as a comment bubble in your control panel. Your questions or comments in that chat section only come to me, so please be sure to use that Q&A panel for content questions for our panelists. We are recording the webinar today. It will be posted on the Bioenergy Technologies Office website at a later date along with these slides. Please see the URL provided on the screen here. And if you're interested in learning about other BETO news, events, or funding opportunities, we also invite you to sign up to the BETO mailing list shown here. I will post a link to both of these resources in the chat here in a moment. All right now, quick disclaimer before we get going: This webinar, including all audio and images of participants and presentation materials, may be recorded, saved, edited, distributed, used internally, posted on the U.S. Department of Energy's website, or otherwise made publicly available. If you continue to access this webinar and provide such audio or image content, you consent to such use by or on behalf of DOE and the government for government purposes and acknowledge that you will not inspect or approve or be compensated for such use. And with that, I’ll now turn things over to Justin Rickard to introduce our topic and our panelists. Take it away, Justin.
Justin Rickard, National Renewable Energy Laboratory
Thanks, Erik; I appreciate it. And welcome, everybody. I’m Justin Rickard with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and just a few things before we get started with the presentation. Today we'll have an overview of the AlgaePrize competition along with some of the unique characteristics of algae. Our presenters will also discuss some of the algal research areas of interest relevant to this student competition. After the presentations we'll open it up to the audience to ask questions. Next slide, please.
Our presenters today are Dr. Ike Levine from the Algae Foundation and Christy Sterner from the U.S. Department of Energy Bioenergy Technologies Office. And our first speaker is Dr. Ike Levine, president and board chair of the Algae Foundation. Ike is a tenured professor of natural and applied science at the University of Southern Maine and the CEO of Algal Aquaculture Professionals, LLC. Dr. Levine combines over 25 years of applied algal farming, cultivar enhancement, and new product development with over 15 years of academic appointments, including the chemistry department at the University of Hawaii, the biology department at Duke University, and the biology department at Chaminade University. Ike has served as the CEO of Coastal Plantations International Inc., an algal farming processing and marketing company, also CEO of Ficogen Inc., a marine biotechnology company, and VP of Biological Services Inc., a bioscience laboratory and consulting services company. Ike received his master's at the University of South Florida's School of Marine Science under one of our country's last great naturalists, Dr. Harold J. Hum, and received his doctorate from the University of Hawaii – Manoa, studying with the father of commercial algal farming, Dr. Maxwell Doty.
Our second speaker is Christy Sterner. She is a technology manager for the Advanced Algal Systems program in the U.S. Department of Energy Bioenergy Technologies Office. While she has served in many different capacities and programs within BETO over the years, Christy has been in the Advanced Algal Systems program since 2009. She has many projects in her portfolio ranging from core research at the U.S. Department of Energy's national laboratories to larger-scale pilot and demonstration projects. Christy has a B.S. in chemical engineering from the Colorado School of Mines and a research and development and project management background. Before I hand it over to Ike, I’d like to remind you that you can ask questions at any time during the presentation using the Q&A panel. We will collect these and try to address them during the Q&A session at the end of the presentations. OK. Next slide, please. And Ike, take it away.
Dr. Ike Levine, Algae Foundation
Well, thank-you, Justin. As you said I’m Ike Levine from the Algae Foundation and also the director of the AlgaePrize, which is what we're chatting about today. It's a terrific day out east, a warming trend, and so I’m happy to be here and spending time with you this afternoon. Just a wee bit of a shout-out. There's a lot of thank-yous to go around; the AlgaePrize and this webinar are product of a team of truly dedicated professionals from BETO's communications team, the NREL team of seasoned contest professionals that have lent their expertise to the AlgaePrize, and my colleagues at the Algae Foundation. Next slide, please.
I’m here to share some exciting news about a new student competition called the AlgaePrize 2022–2023. Next, please.
The AlgaePrize, it's a new national student-centered bioenergy competition, which kicked off last month, January 2022. It encourages students to pursue innovative ideas for the invention, design, development of technologies within the algae value chain. Next one, please.
The AlgaePrize is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy and their Bioenergy Technologies Office. The AlgaePrize is also supported by the Algae Foundation and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. As we move forward you may hear I’ve shortened some of the names into acronyms: DOE for the U.S. Department of Energy, BETO for Bioenergy Technologies Office, and NREL for the National Renewable Energy Lab.
At the Algae Foundation we believe that products made from algae are natural solutions to the energy, food, economic, and climate challenges facing our world today. Algae have the power to simultaneously put fuels in our vehicles, recycle carbon dioxide, provide nutrition for animals and people, and create jobs for millions of Americans. The Algae Foundation provides algal-based STEM education and workforce development initiatives serving grades K through graduate school, including adult education and extension short courses. We also fund and support the development of future leaders of the algae industry through scholarships, grants, and other financial and organizational support.
I’d also like to take a wee bit of time to thank our partner, the National Renewable Energy Lab. NREL focuses on creating answers to today's energy challenges and has been a big supporter of the AlgaePrize as well as a tremendous partner to the Algae Foundation. Next slide, please.
Here we see a map, but I’d just quickly like to cover some of the Algae Foundation and the Algae Technology Educational Consortium, or ATEC, which is another DOE-funded program that's reached over 120,000 students from all 50 states and 100 countries. And you could see which countries in the sort of the darker green shades, and the little red and blue dots represent the cities and schools that are members of the Algae Academy, our K-12 and our ATEC program. Additional efforts include the summer Algae Science Institutes, algal MOOCs, which are online courses, and a full set of college curricula in algal cultivation and biotechnology. We also have a series of extension efforts called ACES, or the Algae Cultivation Extension Short courses. Next slide, please.
The AlgaePrize: Brand new challenge that calls on the innovation and ingenuity of high school through graduate level students at U.S.-based institutions to support the nation's algal, biofuel, and bioproduct research. The inaugural AlgaePrize competition will take place over approximately a 16-month period between the winter of ‘22 and the spring of ’23, or about three consecutive academic semesters. This is truly a great chance for students to develop real-world solutions that shape the global future of algae by producing biofuels, biofoods, biofeeds, and new industrial compounds. We're asking students to pursue the most innovative ideas they have for invention, design, and development of algal commercialization technologies. Over the course of the AlgaePrize, competitors will develop collaborative and leadership skills by working on multidisciplinary student teams and engage and network with industry professionals, national lab researchers, and academics. We want to get to as many interested and eligible participants as possible to register a team and begin working on developing, designing, and inventing or enhancing specific technology or technologies, cultivation, processing, or new product development within the algae value chain. We especially want to encourage students from minority-serving institutions including historically black colleges and universities or other minority-serving institutions to join the AlgaePrize competition. We are very interested in how student projects could be located in or benefit underserved or underrepresented communities. Next slide, please.
To participate in the AlgaePrize, we have a few set of criteria. First, teams must have a minimum of two student team members at the beginning of the competition. Students must be enrolled in a U.S.-based educational institution, and that could be a high school, accredited community college, a college, university, and/or a graduate school. Students must be enrolled in at least one class and must be pursuing a degree or diploma at the time a student joins a team. And each student will self-certify their eligibility as part of the registration process for the competition. Teams may have students from different schools, different levels of schools. Multiple teams can be supported from each school, but individual students may be members of only one team. And this has been a question we've received several times, so let me repeat that. Individual students may be members of only one team. Each team must have a faculty advisor, and the faculty advisor must be employed at a U.S.-based educational institution. The full eligibility requirements including details about the things I’ve just raised in this slide will be found on the AlgaePrize rules document, a resource which we'll share how to access later on in this presentation. Next slide, please.
The AlgaePrize has three different areas of competition, what we call areas of interest that the teams can focus their research around. First area is production, and in this category – it's a very broad category – we're including cultivar enhancement, aquaculture engineering, cultivation husbandry, and productivity. Second category, downstream processing. So here we're including harvesting technologies, dewatering, processing, and the development of biorefinery applications. And the last is even the broadest category, the identification of novel products or analytical or operational tools, which includes new product development, remote sensing, computer modeling, and the broad category of ecological and environmental services. Next, please.
And here we're going to chat about the timeline. We have a number of important milestones – they're listed here – for the AlgaePrize. I won't go through them all, but I’d like to highlight a few. The first one, March 2, teams must submit their team roster and a 500-word project abstract that summarizes their proposed project. March 2 is quickly approaching, so it's less than two weeks away. Let's quickly get your teams together and submit your abstract. On April 6, about a month later, teams will have to submit their full research plan or a 10-page research synopsis, and in addition to that a team photo. After this stage in the competition, up to 15 student teams will be selected as AlgaePrize finalists and will receive $5,000 to support their research project. Finally, after around 14 months of each team's research, the teams will present their findings at the AlgaePrize competition weekend event, April 14th through the 16th, 2023, in NREL, which is located in Golden, Colorado, and will have an opportunity to engage with a variety of organizations about their careers related to algae technology cultivation and market development. Next, please.
During this AlgaePrize competition weekend event, the 15 finalist teams will present a research poster at a poster session and present their research to a panel of judges and the general public. The top five student teams will be selected as AlgaePrize winners. Each of the winning student teams will be awarded a $10,000 prize. The five winning teams will then present their research to a final panel of judges, and these judges will select a single grand champion and award the grand champion team an additional $5,000 grand prize. Additionally, the five winning teams will be invited to participate in the Algae Biomass Summit in the fall of 2023, to present their research and network with summit participants from the national and international algal communities. So a tremendous amount of information that we've gone through, but now I’d like to turn it over to Christy Sterner to chat with you about algae and more contest details. Thank-you, Christy, and take it away.
Christy Sterner, Bioenergy Technologies Office
Wonderful, thank-you, Ike. Hi, everyone. As previously mentioned I am a technology manager within the Advanced Algal Systems program in the Bioenergy Technologies Office for the U.S. Department of Energy, and I’m going to talk a little bit more about why algae for this competition and provide additional details on the AlgaePrize’s three areas of interest that Ike just recently discussed. Next slide, please.
So our goal through this challenge is for students to gain real-world science, technology, engineering, and mathematics experience while helping to develop the next generation of bioenergy professionals. Next slide, please.
Which brings us to the topic of why algae. The term “algae” refers to a great diversity of organisms, from microscopic cyanobacteria to giant kelp. For purposes of the AlgaePrize, algae is defined as microalgae or macroalgae. Microalgae are microscopic photosynthetic eukaryotic organisms and cyanobacteria, and macroalgae are seaweed, all of which are eligible target organisms for this competition. We selected algae for this competition because the genetic diversity of algae means there are an incredible number of unique properties that can be harvested to develop promising bioenergy, algae, biofuels, and bioproducts. Some of algae's unique properties include the high potential yield per acre; the ability to grow on land not suited for agriculture; the potential for recycling of water and nutrients during production; the ability to grow in saline, brackish, or wastewater; and the relative ease of conversion into fuels and products that are fully compatible with today's vehicles, jets, and delivery systems. Next slide, please.
Algae are unique among the various bioenergy feedstocks being researched and developed by BETO-funded programs. Like traditional crops, algae needs sunlight, nutrients, water, and carbon dioxide (CO2) to grow, but algal production has numerous advantages over the traditional crops that sprout from the dirt. With a high aerial productivity, algae can be up to 10 times more productive than some terrestrial crops being grown today. In fact, some algal strains are capable of doubling in yield overnight. Beyond that there is potential to grow, harvest, and convert algal biomass from microalgae seaweeds and cyanobacteria in every state in the United States if the right growth system is paired with the regional environment. Every year BETO researchers learn more about the composition and genetic makeup of algae and how to adapt it to different climates, how to improve productivity, and how to make it more resilient to pests and disease. Within the AlgaePrize, we're hoping students can expand upon some of these findings or even bring their own research to the table. Next slide, please.
Based on the research areas of interest and the challenges within each of those areas, we hope to see a wide range of innovative projects. Projects within the first area of interest, production, could address the selection, manipulation, and genetic modification of cultivars for increased productivity, biomass composition, and contamination resistance to new and improved cultivation systems. We are super-excited to see what the teams propose for new and innovative projects in the second category, downstream processing. Within this category, water and nutrient management are critical, and innovations here can have major impacts on the techno-economic and life cycle analyses. We may see projects proposing new and improved fractionation techniques. Maybe some will focus on new unit operations solely, how to economically and efficiently make marketable products from the lipids, carbohydrates, and proteins. This of course leads right into the ideas for the third area of interest, novel products and analytical tools. Under viable products and analytical tools, these play a major role in the overall economics and life cycle of the systems. Between the large number of algae species out there and the wide variety of compositions available in those species, there are numerous innovative opportunities available within this interest area. Analytical tools can be utilized everywhere within the algae value chain and can be extremely valuable. It would be exciting to see projects focused on detecting contamination well before crashes and new economical tools for need-based nutrient delivery. Algae have so much potential to make a positive impact on the environment through CO2 reduction and utilization, displacing petroleum and removing contaminants from water systems that the door to innovation in ecological and environmental systems is wide open. Next slide, please.
With that, here's how you can learn more. We have a number of AlgaePrize resources available to guide you through the competition. You can visit energy.gov/AlgaePrize – one word; AlgaePrize is one word – for details about the competition. This is also where you can access a link to the AlgaePrize rules document. You can also email us at [email protected]. Again, that's [email protected] – or AlgaePrize one word – with any questions you have about the competition. Next slide, please.
We hope this has inspired and encouraged you to participate in the AlgaePrize. Please remember to register your team and submit a 500-word abstract by March 2 of 2022. Thank-you, and I think we have time for questions. I’ll turn it back to Justin.
Justin Rickard
Thank-you, Christy and Ike. That was a wonderful overview of the AlgaePrize. I’m looking forward to seeing the innovative student research that comes out of this competition. Before we get to the questions, though, I’d like to remind you that you can ask questions using the Q&A panel. Let's see here, we got a couple questions coming in. I’ll ask these questions, Ike and Christy, and the two of you can decide who will field it. All right, so pretty simple question: Who do we contact during the competition if we have questions?
Ike Levine
Christy, you want to grab that one?
Christy Sterner
Sure, I can. I’m saying I know we're going to give the same answer. The best thing to do is send all your questions to the AlgaePrize mailbox, where any of them can be answered. And again, that's AlgaePrize – make sure I’m giving the right one out, so correct me if I’m wrong, guys – but I believe that's the [email protected].
Justin Rickard
Yep, that's it. That's perfect.
Christy Sterner
All questions should be sent there, and then Ike and I will get answers back to you and posted on the appropriate website, so everybody sees the question and answer.
Justin Rickard
Are there going to be any Q&A opportunities during the AlgaePrize competition?
Ike Levine
Well, I’ll touch on that, and the short answer is yes. We're organizing Q&A webinars after the registration but before the full proposal is done to answer any questions of the teams that have already registered but are preparing their 10-page research synopsis. We also have a Q&A session, a two-week schedule, for the AlgaePrize finalists to present their research synopsis to the AlgaePrize organizers for, just to touch base, answer any questions they may have on process and output. And so we also have on the HeroX website the opportunity to create forums where questions can be posted.
Christy Sterner
Yep, and I would just add to that, that of course the [email protected] is going to be open for the entire competition. So you can send questions there anytime. They are checked regularly and they are sent to Ike and I to answer as they come in.
Justin Rickard
All right. So a couple of people have been asking this: If a student graduates, can they continue to compete with their team? Will they still be invited to AlgaePrize weekend?
Ike Levine
Well, I hope they graduate, and that's a great thing. So but yes, of course. If you're eligible and that eligibility will be this semester, if you're a student taking at least one class towards a degree or certificate program, you are eligible and you maintain your eligibility even if you graduate.
Justin Rickard
And maybe along those lines: Is a student allowed to participate on more than one team?
Ike Levine
Well, I covered that, and I and I’m glad you asked that, because we've already gotten to – submitted several of those questions. The answer is only one team. You know, there are several big departments where a series of graduate students wanted to be on each other's team working on the individual's research topic, but unfortunately you can only officially be a part of a single student competition.
Justin Rickard
So a concern from high school students: If I’m a high school student, is my team going to have to compete with college or even graduate student teams?
Ike Levine
Well, the answer to that is yes. High school students can compete in two different ways. They can be an individual who joins another team that's made out of community college students, college students, and graduate students. So a good mixture and a diversity to a team. Or – and we've been contacted, so we're pretty sure we're going to get 100 percent high school teams. But let me tell you, I’ll put my chips in on the high school teams doing tremendously well. We have one of our – in another contest, we had one of our community colleges put up an algal-based effort in a national engineering prize, and they won. And so they beat universities. They beat graduate students. So please don't be intimidated by the fact that there are many levels of participants in this AlgaePrize. And let's just say I think some of our dedicated high schools are going to do tremendously well.
Christy Sterner
Yep, and I would just tag on to that, too, and say I totally agree. Do not be discouraged if you're a high school team. By all means apply, and try it out, because I think some of our best and biggest out-of-the-box ideas for that algae value chain could come from the high school teams. And I also, of course, encourage – like Ike did, I encourage high school students, team up with your community college counterparts, your university counterparts. Get a nice wide diverse team going, because you have a lot to add. Don't be discouraged because you're going up against graduate students. Not at all.
Justin Rickard
All right, thank-you, Christy. We have questions pouring in. Trying to sift through these quickly. We have an interested student from Indonesia. Is this person eligible for the competition?
Ike Levine
That's a great question, and we've gotten several questions around this theme. How can an international student participate? And an international student can participate if they are attending a U.S.-based institution. Now, there are many U.S. universities that have overseas campuses. Or an international student can be taking online classes for American or U.S.-based institutions of higher learning. So the key is being affiliated with a U.S. registered, affiliated university, graduate school, or community college.
Justin Rickard
All right. I have a couple of abstract questions here. Let me group these. The question is: Do we need to do exactly what we put down on the abstract? In other words, can the project evolve over time?
Ike Levine
Everything evolves. And so we understand the nuances of project drift, let's say. So you're certainly going to bring up a concept in the abstract. The abstract is not graded. It is not part of the judging process. The abstract is a tool that the AlgaePrize organizers will be using to help assemble the portfolio of what the participants will be working on, and then be able to match the expertise to the judging panel. So it's a step in the organization of the AlgaePrize. The 10-page – so five weeks later, each team will develop the 10-page research plan, or what we're coining the research synopsis. That synopsis has to be pretty, pretty close to what you're trying to do. But in every scientific endeavor, the scientific method has no boundaries. So you may start with one hypothesis and discover something completely different. And throughout, the finalists will have three submissions of research updates every three months. And so during those updates, you can introduce a new concept, a new technology, or a new advancement within your effort. And so there's where the adjustments or additions can be introduced to the committee.
Christy Sterner
Can I add on to that briefly? I would actually – I think that's part of encouraging really out-of-the-box thinking and true innovation in what we're seeking, is that this is R&D. And in any research and development project, the research guides where you end up. And so what you propose in that 10-page research plan or research synopsis, that's your best guess and best idea of how you're going to approach what you present and what you propose as your project. But Ike and I – exactly like Ike said, we know that as you go through that research, things are going to change, and you're going to discover maybe something that you propose that is very cool and innovative and totally out of the box – while it sounded really cool and it was a great thing to investigate didn't work. However, that may have led you in a brand new direction that is, you know, even better or has more promise than the previous. And so we absolutely expect that the research is going to guide this and there are going to be changes over the course of your project. We expect that.
Justin Rickard
Nice. One more question on the abstract: In a normal abstract, there are typically results and a conclusion. Are you looking for a traditional abstract, or are we just expected to cover the basics of methods, design, and hypothesis?
Ike Levine
I’m sorry, and I have to apologize – I got just a wee bit distracted. Could you just ask that again?
Justin Rickard
Yeah, don't worry. So they're asking about the abstract format: Are you looking for a traditional abstract, or are we just expected to cover the basics of methods, design, and hypothesis?
Ike Levine
Oh, thank-you, I appreciate that. Again, the hypothesis, unlike for a publication or a symposium, there's an abstract slot in the HeroX website. So the abstract will be uploaded directly to the HeroX website, which you can find the link on the energy.gov/algaeprize website. From there, just give us a paragraph of five – you know, give us a title, give us the name of the school for the name of the team, and take 500 words to describe your hypothesis, how you're going to do it, and perhaps a wee bit of technical introduction to your concept.
Christy Sterner
Yep, and I would throw in there, too, that that's an excellent question, because it is, you know, generally not what you would see as a traditional abstract. If you go to the AlgaePrize rules, which I encourage everyone who's interested to read, it gives you a lot more detail on what we expect or would hope to see in an abstract as well as the research synopsis. And really what we're looking for in the abstract is an overview of your idea and what your anticipated outcomes are. Again, like Ike said, we are not judging or reviewing or giving you comments or scores or anything back on the abstract. We're using it as a tool to pick our judging panels and our expertise for the synopsis. So definitely check out the AlgaePrize rules for more information on what's expected for the abstract, and recognize that it's, yeah, it's not what you might traditionally put in an abstract, but it's more of a summary of your concept, of your idea, that you would like to do for the project.
Ike Levine
Thanks, Christy. That's a great addition to the response. Yes. Any questions ever, go to the rulebook.
Christy Sterner
Yep.
Justin Rickard
All right, maybe a couple questions here on research … So the question is: So the goal of these projects should be to produce algae that is suitable for fuel alternatives, or can the species be products for other purposes such as food fertilizers?
Ike Levine
That's a really good question, and you would think, you know, Department of Energy, it would just be biofuels. But the Department of Energy is so much bigger than that in terms of their algae focus. So this AlgaePrize has so much diversity of what you can be reviewing. The tighter answer is, it's algae for biofuels, biofeed, biofood, bioproduct, ecological and environmental services. We're talking about improving cultivars through genetics or other type of molecular technologies. We're talking about new cultivation techniques, new ways to protect algae from predators, or herbivores, or waste algae or epiphytic algae. We're looking at new harvesting techniques, new product development in terms of biopolymers. We're seeing all the new types of bioplastics that are coming from algae. We're also looking at tools, remote sensing tools. We're talking about computer modeling. We're talking about life cycle analyses. We're talking about automation. So there's almost an unlimited areas of endeavor for this contest. Again, all having to be rooted in algal-based value chain. But again, that is a really big, big category. So no, it is not reserved for only algal-based biofuels. That is the ultimate prize of the algae commercialization renaissance. But for this contest, the entire regime of algal-based research endeavors are pretty much appropriate.
Justin Rickard
All right, good answer. One more on the kind of research topics here, or the areas of interest: Is it ill-advised to combine topics like cultivation and novel technologies in one proposal when students on a team are focused on different aspects?
Ike Levine
Ooh, that's a great – Christy, do you want me to take that one? I know I’ve been talking too much or whatever, so I’m happy to take it if you'd like me.
Christy Sterner
Sure, go ahead, and I’ll just – I’ll add in, you know, my little commentary on the side.
Ike Levine
OK, great, super-duper. We've been asked that. In fact, I have future presentations by big schools that have three, four potential topics, and their thing is, do we combine, are we diluting resources? The answer is no. If you have a great research topic, if you have a thesis product or a doctoral dissertation, and you want your best friend to participate but he or she is doing something different, then let them run with it. You form a team on your great idea; let them form a team with their great idea. Unless these ideas are really, you know, merging together, you know. Don't be – I mean, be bold. Be bold in terms of if you have a half a dozen graduate students, some maybe junior, and you have established research, form multiple teams. And there's great value in developing a great diversity within your team. Go down into the bio department and find undergraduates. Reach out to your local community colleges and high schools, because there you have unbelievable talent that have vision and passion for algae. I’m just amazed every day when I’m contacted by young people. We were contacted by a middle school, and they were terribly disappointed that we cut off the applicants at high school. And then they started trying to negotiate: Well, if seventh grade could be considered high school somewhere. And so I’m just saying, you know, don't lump, segregate your topics, but diversify your teams.
Christy Sterner
Yep, that's an awesome answer. And I’d like to add to that, too, that I think – so the way we did the areas of interest, yes, it's split between production and downstream processing, followed by novel tools and market products. But we recognize that that covers the entire algae value chain. And so you may see or envision your project to be everything from “we're going to grow algae, we're going to harvest it, we're going to fractionate it into its constituents, to its components, and then we're going to take those components, we're going to make some really cool products out of it.” That's OK, and we recognize that yes, that does really basically cover all three topic areas, which that's OK, too. The biggest thing to consider when you propose an all-encompassing project like that is your resources and the amount of time you have to do the research and what the outcomes are that you expect to get from it. So that's not to discourage you and say that that's not doable. It absolutely is, and we would love to and be excited to see projects that are going to cross categories. We would expect that, because maybe you don't want to focus solely on the production side of it. Maybe you have a cool cultivation system but a big part of doing that cultivation is being able to process that organism and be able to harvest it and then turn it into something. So yes, I think we would absolutely expect that you're going to cross categories in some of these proposals in these projects, and that's perfectly OK.
Justin Rickard
Thank-you. Just two more quick questions on the research. The first one: Does our student team's research need to be original, or can we build on already published algae research?
Ike Levine
Well, if you're building on research, it's still novel. Again, the progress that algae has been making over the last 15 years in terms of microalgae, it has been incremental. There have been some game-changing technologies and there have been incremental improvements. So by all means, if you have – you know, if you're starting with a concept that's been previously worked on but you've developed a unique aspect or an offshoot of it, totally fine. You know, you're going to properly, of course, cite the previous research as the basis of your hypothesis, and then you're going to run with the new stuff. So that's totally OK.
Christy Sterner
Yeah, we would love to see some totally original ideas, too. I mean, this is an opportunity to be completely outside of the box. If you think you have a great idea but it seems wild and crazy, that's OK, because some of the biggest impacts and biggest steps taken are made from something that no one has thought of yet. So we want it all. Original ideas, ideas that are building, that are still novel and original, like Ike said, that are building on the current research that's out there.
Justin Rickard
All right, so another one here: Is it OK to contact bioenergy researchers in this field to consult, advise, or review our team's work?
Ike Levine
Absolutely. And I’ll give you several, several examples of what's appropriate. The whole network of national labs. We have contacted the algae portions of those national labs and asked them if they would be willing to open up their laboratories either for fee for service – and that's part of what the $5,000 are for, to support, you know, external needs for analytics, to be potential mentors, to be potential external advisors. Totally OK. Same with commercial entities. Each individual team can fund-raise and try to bring in sponsors to assist in augmenting their research, and that's totally appropriate. There are tremendous amount of intellectual capital at algal-based companies or technology companies that you can reach out for assistance. And again, you're going to list them as team advisors. You need that one official faculty mentor, and that is your, you know, official registrant as part of the team, but after that you can have an unlimited amount of advisors: foreign, domestic, commercial, national lab, academic. Yeah, I think I covered all the of the potential areas that people can reach out to.
Christy Sterner
Yep, and I would add to that that Ike and I are excited for the opportunities that we will have throughout the competition to introduce the team to people that work in this industry, whether it's through the national labs or the various universities, colleges, and community colleges that are in this area, as well as the industrial partners that we have. They're just – all of the people in this industry working and are super-passionate about it, they're excited about the AlgaePrize, and they look forward for the chances to talk with you, work with you, answer your questions, and provide information, and even, you know, research, data, analysis, things well beyond just talking with you about your projects. So yes, by all means reach out to the industry players, the folks that are out there. Get their input. You're going to get to meet a lot of them through the competition, anyway, because we have a lot of networking opportunities and some ideas particularly about the competition weekend to introduce the student teams to this industry.
Justin Rickard
All right, thank-you, thank-you, Christy. I want to do a faculty question and get into some funding questions: Are faculty allowed to sponsor more than one team on one campus, more than one team on two different campuses?
Ike Levine
Yes, yes, see – who thought I could be less than long-winded on a response?
Christy Sterner
That was just awesome: Yes, yes.
Ike Levine
A faculty member could sponsor or be the registered faculty advisor to multiple teams between, or the different groups or multiple teams within an area of interest. They could also support a team – let's say university A and B, you can have one faculty advisor that has students from both universities or both a university or community college.
Justin Rickard
All right, let's see some funding questions here: So if my team is selected to go to the competition weekend at NREL, do we have to pay our own travel expenses?
Ike Levine
Very good question; appreciate that. The 15 – up to 15 competition team finalists will have a travel budget. That travel budget will support up to four students and the faculty advisor. Their travel will be paid for. Their hotel rooms will be paid for. Their food will be paid for. If for instance you have a large team, you have 10 members, and you're welcome to bring all 10 members, but member number 5 through 10 will have to be paid for by either the team fundraising or individuals paying, or their school picking up the tab. But the AlgaePrize will pay for four students and one teacher, or one faculty advisor.
Justin Rickard
OK, the next question self-answered probably: Can students participate in fundraising events?
Ike Levine
Absolutely. You can, you know, sell lemonade or you can have corporate sponsors. You know, you can have signage. You know, you can have cool T-shirts. And we encourage – what is it called, bling? You know, just to develop an identity for each of the teams. And you can do that at the student level, at the fundraising level. So yes, fundraising is totally permissible in all forms.
Justin Rickard
Do winners have to pay taxes on the prize money?
Ike Levine
Oh, well, I – and we'll get back to you. This a question, I think I know the answer. Maybe Christy absolutely knows the answer. But just like – if you would – right now, there's the student challenge on “Jeopardy,” and those students who win, while even just showing up, you win $10,000. You have to pay taxes on that. So you have to add that W-2 to your winnings. But we will get an official ruling, and we will put the answer on our Q&A section of the HeroX website. My initial response is yes, I believe. Well, that's – let's just say we'll find the answer and get back to you.
Christy Sterner
Right, because I think it's going to depend on – I can't remember the thresholds for the tax laws, because of course the $10,000 prize, if you have a five-member team then you might consider that means that each team member gets $2,000. And I don't know if that falls above or below the threshold for reporting. So it'll just depend on what the IRS rules are on that. But the nice thing to think about is I can guarantee you I would know for sure, if it was a $10,000 prize to an individual, yes, you pay taxes on that. But not because I’ve ever won $10,000, but if you did. But that number goes down depending on the number of people you have on your team and how you choose to split up the prize money. So like Ike said, we'll get back to you and post the answer.
Justin Rickard
Thank-you. I want to get back into the projects. Here's a question that just popped up: What type of projects are not eligible, explicitly? Is there a trend in the type of projects that get rejected due to ineligibility?
Christy Sterner
Ike, I’ve got a really quick answer for that one.
Ike Levine
Right, go for it.
Christy Sterner
Anything that's not algae related. It has to be algae related. But I’ll hand it back over to Ike for a more succinct, better-worded answer.
Ike Levine
No, I don't believe that we will be eliminating any abstracts, unless, you know, it has nothing to do with algae. But the judging will weed that out. But from an organizational point of view, we've talked about algae value stream. We've talked about commercialization. So pure taxonomy, you know, the naming of a new algae – or alga, excuse me – that probably wouldn't score well. And so there are certain areas of pure algal science that have absolutely no commercial applicability nor any technology applicability, or any advancements in the value chain, although narrow, probably won't do well. So again, I would say systematics, taxonomy, probably are not going to score well. Just because of the criteria. Some of the criteria's potential impact – so if you name something for porphyra or pyropia – probably is not going to affect the nori market. So that's an example of something that probably wouldn't do well, just because of the scoring criteria that are in the rules wouldn't allow a judge to give it a high grade.
Christy Sterner
Yep, and that was actually an excellent reference, because of course (plug-plug-plug) please check out the AlgaePrize rules, because there's a significant amount of detail in what we would like to see in the synopsis, as well as the review criteria. So it's completely transparent. You can see exactly what the judges will be looking for in your synopsis and how they are going to score and review those. So given there's a significant amount of information in there, once you look through that information I think it will give you a much, much better idea of what might not score well. I think Ike gave some great examples, and once you read the criteria I think you'll get a much, much better feel that it's pretty wide open on what's allowed within the competition and what would fit into those criteria. So check out the AlgaePrize rules. Number one document for reference.
Justin Rickard
Yeah. Yes, and you can get to those rules and the Q&A and registration through energy.gov/AlgaePrize. One more question on the money that's distributed. Not the prize money but the funding: Is the money distributed for any purpose, or does it have to go to the research costs?
Ike Levine
Well, actually the – and there's two answers. The $5,000 that are awarded to each of the up to 15 AlgaePrize finalists has always been intended to support the yearlong or 14-month long research program. But there are no firm criteria of what you can and can't spend it on. So, you know, if you want to buy cultivars from algal collections, you want to pay for laboratory analytics, do you want to pay for a speaker to come in, you want to buy a piece of, small piece of equipment, cultivation supplies, remote sensing gear. Those are all things that was anticipated to use the $5,000 as startup funds for the research. In terms of the prize money, we've put no restrictions on that whatsoever. That's the, you know, that’s the prize money. So no. The first $5,000, yes. The next set of prizes, it's whatever the team and faculty advisor choose to do with it.
Justin Rickard
All right. This one, it might be obvious, but I’ll ask it: How much background experience with or knowledge of algae is needed in order to participate in the AlgaePrize?
Ike Levine
To participate? Zero. One, you could have the greatest remote sensing device, or you could be the, you know, a genius computer modeler and come up with a new modeling system for gigaton scale offshore seaweed farm. So there are certain techniques and technologies. You've developed a better way for genetically altering algae, but you're a yeast, you know, geneticist. So again you can have ancillary technology skills that aren't related to algae but you're a member of a team, and other members of the team have great algal experience. So that's the beauty of the diversification of participants, both in subject matter and in age and school level.
Christy Sterner
Yep, and I would just further that by saying that's one of the cool things about this competition, is it's – we're totally promoting partnering. That's the idea. You know, get a nice, good, diverse team going with multidisciplinary backgrounds, where you have folks that maybe, like Ike said, you know, you have some great engineering technology or device or technique that you can apply to algae, although you know nothing about algae. And so you partner and get on a team with somebody who knows a lot about algae or who might know a lot about bacteria and thinks they can apply that to algae, or, you know, that's – we want the diversity in those teams, and you actually need it for a good research project. So I agree with Ike, it starts at zero, and it can go all the way up to somebody who is 100 percent focused on algae. Absolutely.
Justin Rickard
All right, it looks like we are at the top of the hour. I can't believe that hour went by really fast. If you didn't get your question answered, you're welcome to send them to the email address at the top of the slide, [email protected]. For more information, registration and rules and guidelines for the AlgaePrize, please head on over to the web address at the bottom of this slide, energy.gov/algaeprize. The recording of this webinar will be posted to the BETO webinars web page as soon as possible. We'll try to get that up for folks who missed it or if you'd like to listen to it again. So I’d like to thank Dr. Ike Levine and Christy Sterner for taking the time to address your questions today. And don't forget, March 2 is the registration deadline for the AlgaePrize competition. All right, have a great rest of your day, everybody.
Ike Levine
Good luck, think on algae.
Christy Sterner
Yep, hope to hear from you by the second. Take care.