In 2018, UConn iGEM developed project BASSET (Biological Alkane Synthesis through Shuttled Electron Transport). The goal of BASSET was to engineer E. coli to produce biofuel (short-chained alkanes) in a microbial electrosynthesis (MES) system. An MES is a circuit consisting of an anode and a cathode in separate media chambers, with the microbes on the cathode side. The chambers are connected by a semipermeable membrane and a wire with a load, creating the circuit. Protons cross th semipermeable membrane to bind with electrons and oxygen, making water molecules. From the power supply at the anode, the electrons travel to the cathode where the microbes act as the electron acceptors.

The genetically engineered E. coli use these electrons to produce reducing equivalents such as NADH or NADPH in the cell. This functionality is gained by heterologous expression of the MtrCAB pathway and the Cytochrome A from Shewanella oneidensis, as well as phenazine molecules (secreted extracellular electron shuttles) produced by the PhzA-H machinery from Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The reducing equivalents from the MES pathway provide energy for a biosynthesis pathway that produces alkanes from fatty acyl-ACPs. Heterologous expression of pmt1231 from Prochlorococcus marinus and acr from Clostridium acetobutylicum, overexpression of the endogenous fadK and a mutant tesA, and deletion of endogenous fadE and fadR create a pathway to achieve this goal.