Four B.S. Biology seniors are pursuing this month new possibilities and opportunities in their academic discipline.
They are Charles Gan, Jed Emmanuel Reysoma, Jules Vern Garcia and Rein Juan Duego Nillos. They call themselves ‘The 4 Phosphateers’.
On August 10, they will pitch their proposed project, “Harnessing Hot Spring-Derived Thermophilic Bacteria as Phosphate Solubilizes for Enhanced Bio fertilizer Development” as a finalist in the inaugural Leave a Nest Philippines Regional Technology Planter competition.
The regional finals will be held at the Iloilo Convention Center in Iloilo City.
Leave a Nest is a Japan-based organization dedicated to advancing science and technology for global happiness.
The Tech Planter initiative, launched in Japan in 2914 and introduced in the Philippines in 2017, aims to support deep tech researchers and startup groups.
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Mentoring the USLS researchers is my former colleague at USLS, Dr. Joval Martinez, a fellow Service-Learning advocate.
Doc Joval said that this year, for the first time, the focus is on the Visayas Region. USLS and eight other university-based and startup teams in the Visayan regions, will vie for funding for the project that winners will continue to work with business partners of Leave a Nest Philippines, he said.
Dr. Martinez is assisted in mentoring the 4 Phosphateers by Dr. Christian Del Castillo, director of the National Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology Visayas and a UPV professor.
Doc Joval also acknowledged the mentoring assistance of Dr. Ronnie Gicana, a Filipino scientist working with Taiwan’s Academia Sinica.
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A dynamic and resourceful professor, Dr. Martinez worked on his Doctor of Science in Microbiology degree at Tokyo Metropolitan University from 2016 to 2019.
Because of the pandemic, he stayed in Japan for two more years. “I took the opportunity to take up his post doctoral studies as a fellow also at TMU in 2020 and Hiroshima University in 2021,” he told me.
Dr. Martinez has shared his studies in academic presentations in universities in South Korea, Japan, Vancouver in Canada and in New York, U.S.A.
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With just about a week left for the pitching event, Gan, the team leader shared what motivated the team to focus on their chosen topic.
We were studying the previous research of our seniors, he recalled, and we realized that one of the abilities of the bacteria they wrote about could be applied to combat real-world problems.
In this case, he said, we found out that the phosphate solubilizing potential of JQTJ1 could be applied to reduce the amount of phosphate fertilizers we use by breaking down the phosphate that is already present in the soil.
“While technology like this also exists, what made us to be motivated to study JQTJ1 are these: the bacterial strain responsible for phosphate solubilization in particular is its unique origin, since it came from a hot spring it naturally is more tolerant to higher temperatures; and a trend we are increasingly seeing due to rising global temperatures,” Gan emphasized.
We want to develop a sustainable solution to low phosphates in soil that may be resistant to the rising global temperatures, the team leader underscored.
He also shared the challenges they encountered along the way and what they did to overcome them.
“We mostly lack the equipment and a wide knowledge base to help us in our endeavors. Were grateful that Tech Planter is offering the opportunity to fund our project,” he pointed out.
He is thankful for insights shared by soil scientists, agriculturalists and farmers which he described as “a great help in making our project a viable solution to real-world problems,” adding “we’re doing our best gathering perspectives from people in the fertilizer industry to give us their insights on the project.”
With the competition fast approaching, the team leader said: We’re just ironing out some kinks in our paper, practicing the pitch, and learning as much as we can at tech planters’ mentoring sessions.
And he punctuated his thoughts with the resolve: “We really want to make this solution a reality.”
May the Lord guide the 4 Phosphateers and Doc Joval in this journey toward a new possibility and opportunity.
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He spreads out the northern skies over empty space; he suspends the earth over nothing. He wraps up the waters in his clouds, yet the clouds do not burst under their weight. (Job 26:7-8) | NWI
