Monday, February 13, 2006

The Applied Science of Symbiosis


Happy Day After Darwin Day!

An interesting article from MSNBC published today regarding the conversion of biomass to fuel using gut bacteria from insects and cellulolytic fungi. This area holds alot of promise in reducing the costs of synthetic fermentation in my opinion.

Check it out.

The significant phrase "directed evolution" caught my attention....

Through a genetic modification known as directed evolution, Iogen has souped up fungus microbes so they spew copious amounts of digestive enzymes to break down straw into sugars. From there, a simple fermentation — which brewers have been doing for centuries — turns sugar into alcohol.

...as did the closing paragraphs.

At the California Institute of Technology, Jared Leadbetter is mining the guts of termites for possible tools to turn wood chips into ethanol. Leadbetter said there are some 200 microbes that live in termite bellies that help the household pest convert wood to energy.

Those microbes or their genetic material can be used to produce ethanol-making enzymes. So scientists at the Energy Department’s Joint Genome Institute in Walnut Creek, Calif., are now sequencing the microbe genes in hopes of finding a key to ethanol production.

“We have this idea that microbes are pests,” said Leadbetter, who has been studying termite guts for 15 years. “But most microbes are beneficial.”


Photo of worker termites courtesy of M. Potter, Univ. of Kentucky.

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