Cyanobacteria That Produces Biofuel From Salty Water
By Nick April 25, 2008
Researchers from the University of Texas, Austin have created a cyanobacteria which produces cellulose that could be converted into biofuels like ethanol. The microbe doesn’t secrete just cellulose, it also produces glucose and sucrose, both sources for ethanol.
The cyanobacteria was created by Professor R. Malcolm Brown Jr. and Dr. David Nobles Jr. who said that it can be grown on non-agricultural lands with the contribution of salty water. The findings of the researchers also show that the cyanobacteria needs sunlight in order to secrete cellulose and the glucose and sucrose can be cropped continuously without any harm done to the cyanobacteria.
This cyanobacteria is very cheap to produce and it can be one of the key findings that will make us forget the petroleum and start producing more renewable energy.
Topics: Energy |
9 Responses to “Cyanobacteria That Produces Biofuel From Salty Water”
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This sounds great and its just a short article, but what concerns me is if the were to get out into the real worlds Oceans (salt water), couldn’t this cause a ecological disaster?
Like a self-spilling oil spill?
It has to be under controlled conditions, there are microbes that EAT other microbes you know. It’s more likely that these things would become lunch then cause some sort of disaster.
we have all kinds of cellulose already, what we really need is a good way to convert it to more simple sugars
that’s awesome!!!! whoooooooooooooo!!! grrrrrrrrrrrrrreeeatt!!!!!!!! yeeeeeeeeeeeehaaaaaa…
That is something to think about, Jipa. It seems to be human nature to grab onto a new invention that holds lots of promise, but which has not been thought through carefully to see if anything could go wrong. And, of course, we can never see all the consequences of a new invention when it first comes out. Like who knew the invention of the internal combustion engine would someday lead to the entire atmosphere of our planet getting too warm.
and later that day the ocean was devoured by a rapidly evolving and reproducing bacterium of unknown origin.
The problem now is to get this technology past the corn cartel and its agents in Congress. Don’t laugh. There is already a statute prohibiting the production of fuel alcohol from cane sugar, a law written by lobbyists for the corn growers. Don’t be surprised to see any proposal to use otherwise useless land for cyanobacteria production greeted by wails from newly-created “Save our desert!” organizations. Note also that this cyanobacterium is only part of a biofuel source. You need yeasts or other bacteria to ferment the celulose and sugars into alcohols. Fermantation plants tend to be smelly, which will bring out the NIMBY patrols, even if we modify existing petroleum refineries (”Yes, we’ve been living with the stinks from the refinery for generations, but this is a *new* stink!”). We’ll also need engines modified to run on alcohols instead of the more energy-rich hydrocarbons we now use. It *always* takes longer and costs more.
Wow sounds great but man it would be terrible if it started creating more of itself without us helping it. Wouldn’t that be scary if it could think and do what it wanted and eat what it wanted…i mean i get that we need more gasoline but this doesn’t sound the safest plan to go with.