US Arpa-E Funding Enlisting Cyanobacteria to Make Fuel For Humans

November 2nd, 2009 by Susan Kraemer

We are actually the second planet-altering species. Three billion years ago, Cyanobacteria were the first. They totally changed this planet to one that is safe for oxygen breathers. That was a big change for species at the time, and most species didn’t make it. Nearly all of them went extinct.

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If we’re lucky, we won’t change our environment as much as Cyanobacteria did. That’s the goal of the US Department of Energy ARPA-E. Inspired by the success of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency; ARPA-E will fund high-risk, high-reward advances with the potential to completely change the way our species generates and consumes energy.

Arizona State’s Wim Vermass was of the 37 recipients of the DOE ARPA-E funding. He is teaching the ancient species to make our future fuel and to custom-make it just the way our species wants it.

Scientists at Arizona State University are trying to get Cyanobacteria to make our fuel in such a way that we don’t have to use any special solvents (or any energy at all) towards getting it out of them. And we don’t want them to leave such a mess behind when they die for us. So Wim Vermass is teaching them to secrete just what we need, and not die doing it.

“In the past, we had to ‘demolish the factory,’ basically break open the cyanobacteria, to get the product (lipids or fatty acids) out,” Vermaas explains. “This process will avoid that because the bacteria secrete the product.”

This avoids much of the environmental drawbacks to current cyanobacteria or algae conversion processes by not generating leftover biomass – or waste product – when the organisms are cracked open, and avoiding the use of solvents and additional energy normally needed to extract the lipids or fatty acids from the photosynthetic microbes.

Arizona State University: $5,205,706 grant to develop Cyanobacteria that produce and secrete fatty acids for biofuel feedstock using just sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide as inputs.

Cyanobacteria Designed for Solar-Powered Highly Efficient Production of Biofuels

Direct Solar Fuels received 5 of the 37 awards.The other four are using their grants to work on:

Scale Solar Conversion of CO2 and Water Vapor to Hydrocarbon Fuels: (Penn State)

Affordable Energy from Water and Sunlight: (Sun Catalytix Corporation)

Shewanella as an Ideal Platform for Producing Hydrocarbon Biofuels: (U of M)

A Genetically Tractable Microalgal Platform for Advanced Biofuel Production: (Iowa State)

Image: Muzikal203

Source: EurekaAlert via GreenCarCongress

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Tags: Arizona State University, ARPA-E, bacteria secrete the product, cyanobacteria, DOE, Wim Vermass

About the Author

Susan Kraemer writes at CleanTechnica, CSP-Today, PV-Insider , SmartGridUpdate, and GreenProphet. She has also been published at Ecoseed, NRDC OnEarth, MatterNetwork, Celsius, EnergyNow, and Scientific American. As a former serial entrepreneur in product design, Susan brings an innovator's perspective on inventing a carbon-constrained civilization: If necessity is the mother of invention, solving climate change is the mother of all necessities! As a lover of history and sci-fi, she enjoys chronicling the strange future we are creating in these interesting times. Follow Susan on Twitter @dotcommodity.

http://www.freeelectric.info Scott Sterk

Very informative post. Thanks!
http://www.freeelectric.info Scott Sterk

Very informative post. Thanks!
http://jimspaulding.wordpress.com Jim Spaulding

Rich,

I think that Bob may be speaking to the fact that public funds are being used to bankroll these projects. Considering this fact, I think that he is not entirely remiss in wanting some of the fruits of said public funds to become public domain. A public library pays for books with public funds(as well as private) in order to make them available to the public. Are public libraries to be considered unrealistic because people can go read a book without having to buy their own personal copy?
http://jimspaulding.wordpress.com Jim Spaulding

Rich,

I think that Bob may be speaking to the fact that public funds are being used to bankroll these projects. Considering this fact, I think that he is not entirely remiss in wanting some of the fruits of said public funds to become public domain. A public library pays for books with public funds(as well as private) in order to make them available to the public. Are public libraries to be considered unrealistic because people can go read a book without having to buy their own personal copy?
rich EE

Yeah Bob ;

All those scientists who worked for years should just

give away their work . Who needs capitalism [ sarcasm ]
rich EE

Yeah Bob ;

All those scientists who worked for years should just

give away their work . Who needs capitalism [ sarcasm ]
http://extremegreenvillage.com Bob

This is a good use of research funds. The only point is that when the break through comes out I want the information to be made available for everyone and not slowed down by greedy patents. and other restrictive processes that would slow down the invention.
http://extremegreenvillage.com Bob

This is a good use of research funds. The only point is that when the break through comes out I want the information to be made available for everyone and not slowed down by greedy patents. and other restrictive processes that would slow down the invention.