14 DAY TRIAL // A recent paper in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences describes the use of a genetically engineered bacterium to enable direct conversion of biomass to biofuel.
The bacterium is dubbed Caldicellulosiruptor bescii (no, there is nothing to be ashamed of if you did not actually try to read its name), and its mommies and daddies are researcher Janet Westpheling and her colleagues.
As detailed on the official website for the University of Georgia, these brainiacs took the time to develop a method to directly convert biomass to biofuel in an attempt to help the transportation sector green up its act.
Thus, specialist Janet Westpheling and fellow researchers explain that, for the time being, the fact that biomass need be treated before being turned into biofuel is delaying the development of the green transportation fuels industry.
This is because pre-treatment costs quite a lot of money, and because, unless as cost efficient at it gets, no technology has until now managed to become center-stage, the scientists go on to explain.
Still, researcher Janet Westpheling and her colleagues expect that, thanks to the Caldicellulosiruptor bescii bacterium they have successfully created in the lab, the biofuels industry will soon take off.
“Now, without any pretreatment, we can simply take switchgrass, grind it up, add a low-cost, minimal salts medium and get ethanol out the other end,” the specialist says in a statement.
“This is the first step toward an industrial process that is economically feasible,” Janet Westpheling further comments on the importance of her and her colleagues' work.
Information shared with the public says that these two brainiacs spent a total of two years trying to create the perfect Caldicellulosiruptor bescii bacterium that would make direct conversion of biomass to biofuel possible.
Eventually, they managed to fit their bacterium with genes from another anaerobic organism of its kind, and set the basis for a synthetic pathway that makes it possible for Caldicellulosiruptor bescii to produce ethanol directly.
Simply put, they used genetic engineering to create one really cool bacterium that eats grass and eventually poops out biofuel.
Commenting on this achievement, scientist Paul Gilna says, “To take a virtually unknown and uncharacterized organism and engineer it to produce a biofuel of choice within the space of a few years is a towering scientific achievement for Dr. Westpheling's group and for BESC.”
“It is a true reflection of the highly collaborative research we have built within BESC [the BioEnergy Science Center], which, in turn, has led to accelerated accomplishments such as this,” Paul Gilna goes on to add.