In Germany, fuel cells that work with the enzyme hydrogenase are, in principle, just as efficient as those that contain the expensive precious metal platinum as a catalyst. However, the enzymes need an aqueous environment, which makes it difficult for the starting material for the reaction – hydrogen – to reach the enzyme-loaded electrode. Researchers […]
In Washington, the U.S. Department of Energy has announced 36 projects that together have been awarded $80 million to support early-stage bioenergy research and development. Two ASU research teams are among the grantees, with the grants to ASU totaling about $4.5 million. The two teams are headed by Wim Vermaas, Foundation Professor in the School […]
There is no excerpt because this is a protected post.
In Michigan, scientists at the Great Lakes Bioenergy Science Center investigated how five different feedstocks affected process and field-scale ethanol yields. Two annual crops (corn stover and energy sorghum) and three perennial crops (switchgrass, miscanthus, and restored prairie) were pretreated using ammonia fiber expansion, hydrolyzed, and fermented separately using yeast or bacteria. They found that […]
In Wisconsin, an unprecedented comparison of hundreds of species of yeasts has helped geneticists brew up an expansive picture of their evolution over the last hundreds of millions of years, including an analysis of the way they evolved individual appetites for particular food sources that may be a boon to biofuels research. Researchers led by […]
In Sweden, using the energy from the sun and graphene applied to the surface of cubic silicon carbide, researchers at Linköping University, Sweden, are working to develop a method to convert water and carbon dioxide to the renewable energy of the future. They have now taken an important step toward this goal, reporting a method […]
In India, the Hindu newspaper reports that the Department of Biotechnology and The Energy and Research Institute will collaborate on a three-year, $1.5 million research program on advanced biofuels and bio-commodities with the aim of developing as well as commercializing technology. The research center created to implement the program is the fifth such bioenergy R&D […]
In Germany, scientists at the Fraunhofer Institute for Microengineering and Microsystems IMM, working together with twelve research groups from seven countries in the EU project BIOGO, have developed a technique to produce just such an eco-friendly biofuel. The novel fuel’s ingredients come from forests. A prototype novel biofuel plant stands in the courtyard behind the […]
In Wisconsin, a compound that has scientists seeing red may hold the key to engineering yeasts that produce better biofuels. A red pigment called pulcherrimin, naturally produced by several strains of wild yeasts, is synthesized in part through the same biochemical pathway that researchers hope to use to improve production of isobutanol, a promising biofuel […]
In Japan, results from a collaborative study by Tokyo Tech and Tohoku University raise prospects for large-scale production of algae-derived starch after scientists found a “switch” controlling the level of starch content in algae. The study focused on the unicellular red alga Cyanidioschyzon merolae and researchers demonstrated that starch content could be dramatically increased in […]
