Hydrogen can be produced in a way that is carbon neutral by adding bacteria to forestry or household waste in a similar way to that used for biogas production. However, this process does not produce much hydrogen gas for the amount of biomass needed.

Now, researchers at Lund University in Sweden have found that a bacterium called Caldicellulosiruptor saccharolyticus, which was isolated in a hot spring in New Zealand, .produces twice as much hydrogen gas as the bacteria currently used. The discovery increase the possibilities of competitive biological production of hydrogen gas.

According to Karin Willquist, who is presenting a doctoral thesis on the research, "If hydrogen gas is produced from biomass, there is no addition of carbon dioxide because the carbon dioxide formed in the production is the same that is absorbed from the atmosphere by the plants being used. Bio-hydrogen gas will probably complement biogas in the future. A first step towards a hydrogen gas society could be to mix hydrogen gas with methane gas and use the existing methane gas infrastructure. Buses in Malmö, for example, drive on a mixture of hydrogen gas and methane gas."

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A team of MIT Biological Material Group researchers has developed a way of using a modified virus as a kind of biological scaffold that can assemble the nanoscale components needed to split a water molecule into hydrogen and oxygen atoms.

During photosynthesis in plant cells, natural pigments absorb sunlight, while catalysts then promote the use of that energy to split water into its component hydrogen and oxygen molecules.

The MIT team, led by Professor Angela Belcher, engineered a common, harmless bacterial virus called M13 so that it would attract and bind with molecules of  a biological pigment (in this case zinc porphyrins) and a catalyst (iridium oxide). The virus acts as a kind of scaffolding, causing the pigments and catalysts to line up with the right spacing to trigger the water-splitting reaction.

Using the virus to make the system assemble itself improves the efficiency of the oxygen production fourfold.
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Scientists at Arizona State University have reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science that they have genetically engineered bacteria to produce biofuel.

Researchers Xinyao Liu and Roy Curtiss have engineered cyanobacteria (blue-green algae) that continuously secret the oil. 

The scientists started by producing cyanobacteria carrying the enzyme thioesterase, that clips the bonds that bind fatty acid to more complex carrier proteins. This allowed for oil to accumulate within the microbes, to the point where it can no longer be contained.

They then modified two layers of the cyanobacteria’s cellular envelope so that the fatty acid could get out more easily. Once out, it accumulates on the surface of the bacteria’s liquid environment, where it forms an easily-harvested whitish residue.

Finally, the team added genes that caused overproduction of fatty acids, while also removing cellular pathways that weren’t essential to the microbe’s survival. The result was a cyanobacteria that devoted all its resources to oil production and basic survival.

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Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute in Bremen have developed a paint which they say improves the efficiency of ships, aircraft and wind turbines by reducing their flow resistance.

They have achieved this by modelling the paint’s structure on the scales of fast-swimnming sharks which evolved in a manner that significantly diminishes drag.

Carribean Reef Sharl (Image by Albert Kok via Wikimedia)

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Researchers at the Centre de Recherche Paul Pascal in Bordeaux have developed a biofuel cell which converts the chemical energy generated by photosynthesis into electrical energy.

Photosynthesis transforms carbon dioxide and water into glucose and oxygen through a complex series of chemical reactions in the presence of visible light. The researchers have developed a biofuel cell made up of two enzyme-modified electrodes that uses the products of photosynthesis (glucose and oxygen) to produce electricity.

When the cell was inserted in a living plant, in this case a cactus. the scientists observed an increase in electrical current when a desk lamp shining on the cactus was switched on, and a reduction when it was switched off. The scientists were also able to make the first ever observation of the real-time course of glucose levels during photosynthesis.

The researchers showed that a biofuel cell inserted in a cactus leaf could generate power of 9 μW per cm². Because this yield is proportional to light intensity, stronger illumination accelerates the production of glucose and oxygen, so more fuel is available to operate the cell.

In the future, this system could form the basis for a new, environmentally-friendly and renewable way to transform solar energy into electrical energy

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A research team from the Joint BioEnergy Institute and biotech firm LS9 have modified E. coli bacteria to produce biodiesel from plant sugars. The biodiesel can be transported in diesel pipelines and burned in standard diesel engines. It releases far fewer greenhouse gases than conventional fossil diesel.

E. coli was previously known to synthesize fatty acids, key ingredients in forming biofuels efficiently. But the bacterium normally manufactures only as many fatty acids as it needs to survive. The research team was able to manipulate an E. coli strain to create more fatty acids than the bacterium itself would need. When the E. coli interacted with sugar cane, it fermented the plant’s sugars and generated a surplus of fatty acids - producing biofuel straight from the biomass.

The project’s next step will be adapting the process for fibres other than sugar cane, expanding its potential feedstocks to grass or crop waste.

While other mathods of producing biodiesel require expensive chemical processes to convert biomass into fuel, the researchers believe that the use of bacteria has the potential to produce biodiesel at competitive prices within two years.

Another team of researchers, from the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, have developed a different way of tusing bacteria to make biofuel in a reaction is powered directly by energy from sunlight.

The team has genetically modified a cyanobacterium to consume carbon dioxide and produce the isobutanol. Isobutanol holds great potential as a gasoline alternative.

The researchers genetically engineered a strain cyanobacterium (blue-green algae) that intakes carbon dioxide and sunlight and produces isobutyraldehyde gas. The low boiling point and high vapor pressure of the gas allows it to easily be stripped from the system. Inexpensive chemical catalysis are used to convert isobutyraldehyde gas to liqisobutanol,

Ideally, the new system would be installed next to an existing fossil fuel burning power plant. It would potentially consume the greenhouse gases emitted from the power plants and recycled them as liquid fuel.

(Based on sources including the journal Nature)

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Two engineers, Eben Bayer and Gavin McIntyre, at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York State, when studying the properties of different cultures of mushrooms, noticed that by manipulating the growth environment, they were able to shape the material’s strength, flexibility and temperature tolerance. This led to the development of a product which they called "Greensulate".

Greensulate is a renewable and biodegradable organic material that can be used for thermal insulation, fire insulation and as a substitute for the polystyrene used in packaging and many other applications. Polystyrene, on the other hand, is made from non-renewable petrochemicals; it is not biodegradable and takes up large amounts of landfill space where it can last for thousands of years.

Greensulate is made of very cheap agricultural by-products of rice, buckwheat and cotton seed. This is used as a base for the growth of a type of mushroom called pleurotus ostreatus. The mushroom’s mycelium (the mass of threadlike filaments from which the fruiting body of the mushroom grows) binds the agricultural by-products together. The whole is put into moulds in a dark environment and left to grow for up to two weeks. When it has filled the mould, its is dried to prevent further growth and avoid moss or fungus allergy due to exposure to the product.

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Creative Water Solutions, a company in Minnesota, says that it has developed a system for keeping swimming pools clean while drastically reducing the use of chlorine and other harsh chemicals.

The patented treatment system uses sphagnum moss to inhibit the formation of bacterial colonies called biofilms. Chlorine kills free-floating bacteria but biofilms absorb the chemical, requiring ever-greater doses to keep a pool clean. Using the moss reduces the amount of chlorine needed by about two-thirds.

The company is already selling its treatment for backyard swimming pools and is undertaking its first large-scale commercial test this summer at a public aquatic complex in St. Paul.

Creative Water Solutions is currently importing the sphagnum moss from New Zealand where it is harvested commercially for germinating orchids.

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Researchers writing in the journal Science say that converting biomass to electricity which is used to power electric cars is far more efficient than growing plants to make bioethanol for fuel for cars.

They calculate that, compared to ethanol used for internal combustion engines, bioelectricity used for battery-powered vehicles would deliver an average of 80% more miles of transportation per acre of crops, while also providing double the greenhouse gas offsets to mitigate climate change.

The researchers performed a life-cycle analysis of both bioelectricity and ethanol technologies, taking into account not only the energy produced by each technology but also the energy consumed in producing the vehicles and fuels, Bioelectricity was the clear winner in the transportation-miles-per-acre comparison, regardless of whether the energy was produced from corn or from switchgrass, a cellulose-based energy crop. Click here to read the rest of this entry.

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A team of engineers at Penn State University has discovered a tiny microbe which can use electricity to directly convert carbon dioxide and water to methane, producing a portable energy source with a potentially neutral carbon footprint.

Methanogenic microorganisms produce methane in marshes and dumps but scientists thought that the organisms turned hydrogen or organic materials, such as acetate, into methane. However, the researchers have now found, while trying to produce hydrogen in microbial electrolysis cells, that their cells produced much more methane than expected.

"We were studying making hydrogen in microbial electrolysis cells and we kept getting all this methane," said Bruce E. Logan, Kappe Professor of Environmental Engineering, Penn State. "We may now understand why."

Microbial electrolysis cells require an electrical voltage to be added to the voltage that is produced by bacteria using organic materials to produce current that evolves into hydrogen. The researchers found that archaea, using about the same electrical input, could use the current to convert carbon dioxide and water to methane without any organic material, bacteria or hydrogen usually found in microbial electrolysis cells. 

"We have a microbe that is self perpetuating that can accept electrons directly, and use them to create methane," said Professor Logan.

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