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Replacing oil 4: Designer bugs
Yeast is pretty talented. The fact that it can turn barley into beer without any help from us is noteworthy enough, but it may have abilities we haven't discovered yet. We already know yeast turns both corn and sugar into ethanol for fuel use. With a little genetic manipulation, it may be able to create fuels more like gasoline that require less energy to extract. Bacteria has similar talents. Special strains of modified E. coli are doing the same thing in the lab.
This type of effort is getting a lot of attention lately. A number of companies are doing this kind of research, trying to create designer bugs that can take substances like sugar or cellulose and rearrange the atoms into something that will power your car. We received an interesting video from the Environmental Defense Fund that discusses just that.
The only problem with this technology is that it is not ready to be commercialized yet. However, with all the energy urgency lately, the effort is being made and the potential payoff is astronomical. Anyone who makes this sort of thing a reality could pass Bill Gates in wealth.
Replacing oil 4: Designer bugs
July 10, 2008
Yeast is pretty talented. The fact that it can turn barley into beer without any help from us is noteworthy enough, but it may have abilities we haven't discovered yet. We already know yeast turns both corn and sugar into ethanol for fuel use. With a little genetic manipulation, it may be able to create fuels more like gasoline that require less energy to extract. Bacteria has similar talents. Special strains of modified E. coli are doing the same thing in the lab.This type of effort is getting a lot of attention lately. A number of companies are doing this kind of research, trying to create designer bugs that can take substances like sugar or cellulose and rearrange the atoms into something that will power your car. We received an interesting video from the Environmental Defense Fund that discusses just that.
The only problem with this technology is that it is not ready to be commercialized yet. However, with all the energy urgency lately, the effort is being made and the potential payoff is astronomical. Anyone who makes this sort of thing a reality could pass Bill Gates in wealth.
Posted by Peter Welander on July 10, 2008 | Comments (0)
Industries: Information Control
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