Genetically altered trees and plants could help counter global warming

Forests of genetically altered trees and other plants could sequester several billion tons of carbon from the atmosphere each year and so help ameliorate global warming, according to estimates published in the October issue of BioScience.

The study [pdf], by researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Oak Ridge National Laboratory, outlines a variety of strategies for augmenting the processes that plants use to sequester carbon dioxide from the air and convert it into long-lived forms of carbon, first in vegetation and ultimately in soil. Besides increasing the efficiency of plants' absorption of light, researchers might be able to genetically alter plants so they send more carbon into their roots—where some may be converted into soil carbon and remain out of circulation for centuries. Other possibilities include altering plants so that they can better withstand the stresses of growing on marginal land, and so that they yield improved bioenergy and food crops. Such innovations might in combination boost substantially the amount of carbon that vegetation naturally extracts from air, according to the authors' estimates. The researchers stress that the use of genetically engineered plants for carbon sequestration is only one of many policy initiatives and technical tools that might boost the carbon sequestration already occurring in natural vegetation and crops.

The article, by Christer Jansson, Stan D. Wullschleger, Udaya C. Kalluri, and Gerald A. Tuskan, is the first in a Special Section in the October BioScience that includes several perspectives on the prospects for enhancing biological carbon sequestration. Other articles in the section analyze the substantial ecological and economic constraints that limit such efforts. One article discusses the prospects for sequestering carbon by culturing algae to produce biofuel feedstocks; one proposes a modification of the current regulatory climate for producing genetically engineered trees in the United States; and one discusses societal perceptions of the issues surrounding the use of genetically altered organisms to ameliorate warming attributed to the buildup of greenhouse gases.

Genetically Altered Trees and Plants Could Help Counter Global Warming

Technorati Tags: biofuel,biotechnology,genetic engineering,carbon sequestration,carbon capture,greenhouse gas,carbon dioxide,bioenergy

New insights into how stem cells determine what tissue to become

ANN ARBOR, Mich.---Within 24 hours of culturing adult human stem cells on a new type of matrix, University of Michigan researchers were able to make predictions about how the cells would differentiate, or what type of tissue they would become. Their results are published in the Aug. 1 edition of Nature Methods.

Differentiation is the process of stem cells morphing into other types of cells. Understanding it is key to developing future stem cell-based regenerative therapies.

"We show, for the first time, that we can predict stem cell differentiation as early as Day 1," said Jianping Fu, an assistant professor in mechanical engineering and biomedical engineering who is the first author on the paper.

"Normally, it takes weeks or maybe longer to know how the stem cell will differentiate. Our work could speed up this lengthy process and could have important applications in drug screening and regenerative medicine. Our method could provide early indications of how the stem cells are differentiating and what the cell types they are becoming under a new drug treatment."

In this study, Fu and his colleagues examined stem cell mechanics, the slight forces the cells exert on the materials they are attached to. These traction forces were suspected to be involved in differentiation, but they have not been as widely studied as the chemical triggers. In this paper, the researchers show that the stiffness of the material on which stem cells are cultivated in a lab does, in fact, help to determine what type of cells they turn into.

"Our research confirms that mechanical factors are as important as the chemical factors regulating differentiation," Fu said. "The mechanical aspects have, until now, been largely ignored by stem cell biologists."

The researchers built a novel type of stem cell matrix, or scaffold, whose stiffness can be adjusted without altering its chemical composition, which cannot be done with conventional stem cell growth matrices, Fu said.

The new scaffold resembles an ultrafine carpet of "microposts," hair-like projections made of the elastic polymer polydimethylsiloxane---a key component in Silly Putty, Fu said. By adjusting the height of the microposts, the researchers were able to adjust the rigidity of the matrix.

In this experiment, the engineers used human mesenchymal stem cells, which are found in bone marrow and other connective tissues such as fat. The stem cells differentiated into bone when grown on stiffer scaffolds, and into fat when grown on more flexible scaffolds. …

New insights into how stem cells determine what tissue to become

Technorati Tags: regenerative medicine,stem cells,biotechnology

MIT researchers harness viruses to split water

Crucial step toward turning water into hydrogen fuel

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- A team of MIT researchers has found a novel way to mimic the process by which plants use the power of sunlight to split water and make chemical fuel to power their growth. In this case, the team used 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.

Splitting water is one way to solve the basic problem of solar energy: It's only available when the sun shines. By using sunlight to make hydrogen from water, the hydrogen can then be stored and used at any time to generate electricity using a fuel cell, or to make liquid fuels (or be used directly) for cars and trucks.

Other researchers have made systems that use electricity, which can be provided by solar panels, to split water molecules, but the new biologically based system skips the intermediate steps and uses sunlight to power the reaction directly. The advance is described in a paper published on April 11 in Nature Nanotechnology.

The team, led by Angela Belcher, the Germeshausen Professor of Materials Science and Engineering and Biological Engineering, engineered a common, harmless bacterial virus called M13 so that it would attract and bind with molecules of a catalyst (the team used iridium oxide) and a biological pigment (zinc porphyrins). The viruses became wire-like devices that could very efficiently split the oxygen from water molecules.

Over time, however, the virus-wires would clump together and lose their effectiveness, so the researchers added an extra step: encapsulating them in a microgel matrix, so they maintained their uniform arrangement and kept their stability and efficiency.

While hydrogen obtained from water is the gas that would be used as a fuel, the splitting of oxygen from water is the more technically challenging "half-reaction" in the process, Belcher explains, so her team focused on this part. Plants and cyanobacteria (also called blue-green algae), she says, "have evolved highly organized photosynthetic systems for the efficient oxidation of water." Other researchers have tried to use the photosynthetic parts of plants directly for harnessing sunlight, but these materials can have structural stability issues.

Belcher decided that instead of borrowing plants' components, she would borrow their methods. In plant cells, natural pigments are used to absorb sunlight, while catalysts then promote the water-splitting reaction. That's the process Belcher and her team, including doctoral student Yoon Sung Nam, the lead author of the new paper, decided to imitate.

In the team's system, the viruses simply act as a kind of scaffolding, causing the pigments and catalysts to line up with the right kind of spacing to trigger the water-splitting reaction. The role of the pigments is "to act as an antenna to capture the light," Belcher explains, "and then transfer the energy down the length of the virus, like a wire. The virus is a very efficient harvester of light, with these porphyrins attached.

"We use components people have used before," she adds, "but we use biology to organize them for us, so you get better efficiency." …

MIT researchers harness viruses to split water

Technorati Tags: nanotechnology,hydrogen economy,solar power,MIT

Canada approves Enviropig™ -- piglets inherit genetic modifications for cleaner manure

 Image: Scott Bauer, ARS.USDA

Piglets Inherit Genetic Modification Canada has approved limited production of animals dubbed "enviropigs™," a genetically modified breed of pigs producing up to 65% less phosphorous in pig poo and urine. The pigs pass the genetic modification along to their young, as well. The very idea that a genetically modified animal rates the moniker "enviro-" points to the severity of the issue addressed by the science behind these pigs. Phosphorous is a fertilizer. Phosphorous in animal and human wastes runs off or discharges to surface waters, where it spurs large algal blooms. The algae use up the oxygen in the water, leaving behind a "dead zone," an area of lake, river, or ocean where nothing can live due to the hypoxic conditions. …

Canada Approves Enviropig™, Piglets Inherit Genetic Modifications for Clean Manure

Technorati Tags: biotechnology,genetic engineering,anoxia,eutrophication

Microbial answer to plastic pollution in the oceans?

ScienceDaily (Mar. 31, 2010) — Fragments of plastic in the ocean are not just unsightly but potentially lethal to marine life. Coastal microbes may offer a smart solution to clean up plastic contamination, according to Jesse Harrison presenting his research at the Society for General Microbiology's spring meeting in Edinburgh.

The researchers from the University of Sheffield and the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science have shown that the combination of marine microbes that can grow on plastic waste varies significantly from microbial groups that colonise surfaces in the wider environment. This raises the possibility that the plastic-associated marine microbes have different activities that could contribute to the breakdown of these plastics or the toxic chemicals associated with them.

Plastic waste is a long-term problem as its breakdown in the environment may require thousands of years. "Plastics form a daily part of our lives and are treated as disposable by consumers. As such plastics comprise the most abundant and rapidly growing component of man-made litter entering the oceans," explained Jesse Harrison.

Over time the size of plastic fragments in the oceans decreases as a result of exposure to natural forces. Tiny fragments of 5 mm or less are called "microplastics" and are particularly dangerous as they can absorb toxic chemicals which are transported to marine animals when ingested. …

Microbial Answer to Plastic Pollution?

Technorati Tags: pollution,plastic,biotechnology

One giant step closer to fuel-from-sunlight by Joule Biotechnologies

Written by Tina Casey, Published on February 15th, 2010

Joule Biotechnologies, Inc. has just announced that a lease agreement has been signed for a new facility in Leander, Texas, which will serve as a pilot plant to develop the company’s solar powered system for producing ethanol and other biofuels.  The energy efficient process is based on photosynthetic microorganisms and it operates without the use of conventional biomass or algae biofuel processes.

CleanTechnica and Gas 2.0 have been eagerly following Joule’s progress, and the company has already produced ethanol and diesel at a lab scale rate.  It plans to start ethanol production this year at the pilot plant, with diesel to follow early next year.  Once operating at full scale, the facility has  the potential to deliver at the rate of 25,000 gallons of ethanol per acre yearly, and 15,000 gallons of diesel.  That could be the tip of the iceberg, because the same process can also yield a variety of high-value chemicals in addition to biofuels.

Joule prefers to call its system “solar fuel,” and rightfully so.  The heart of the process is the company’s proprietary SolarConverter, which contains photosynthetic organisms in a bath of brackish water and nutrients, with carbon dioxide fed in.  While the concept is similar to producing algae biofuel, there are several significant twists.  The organisms are not algae, they are bio-engineered proprietary organisms that produce and secrete fuel without the need for costly fermentation processes, extraction or refinement processes.  The system also skips the need to collect and transport large quantities of biomass. …

One Giant Step Closer to Fuel-from-Sunlight by Joule Biotechnologies

Technorati Tags: biotechnology,solar power,alternative energy,biofuel

Prehistoric patterns: A dinosaur gets color from head to feathery tail

Last week, researchers announced that they had been able to place, for the first time, original colors on a dinosaur—painting in striking stripes on Sinosauropteryx's tail based on new evidence of pigment particles. Today, another team reports that they have decoded the colors of a different dino from head to tail.

The findings, which will be published February 5 in Science, paint a detailed picture of birdlike Anchiornis huxleyi, which has been extinct for some 150 million years and was first described in December 2008.

To establish this dinosaur's overall coloration, the researchers, led by Quanguo Li of the Beijing Museum of Natural History, studied 29 feather samples under a scanning electron microscope. And what they found was quite a dramatic little dinosaur.

"This was no crow or sparrow, but a creature with a very notable plumage," Richard Prum, a professor of ornithology, ecology and evolutionary biology at Yale University, said in a prepared statement. Nevertheless, the coloring isn't fully unfamiliar. Quite to the contrary, as the authors noted in the study, it is "strikingly similar to various living birds including domesticated fowl." …

Prehistoric patterns: A dinosaur gets color from head to feathery tail

Technorati Tags: evolutionary biology,biotechnology

The first hints of a dinosaur's true colors

by Nell Greenfieldboyce

January 27, 2010
Scientists have found evidence of some of the original coloration of a dinosaur that lived about 125 million years ago, showing that it had rings of orange-brown bristly feathers around its tail.

Fossils have revealed a lot about the lives of dinosaurs, but researchers always used to think that the fossil record couldn't show what color they were. "This was the one point at which we had to give up," says paleontologist Mike Benton at the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom, who explains that fossils tend to preserve an animal's hard parts, like bones and teeth, and not soft parts like skin.

But feathers are made of tough proteins. "And, in fact, they can survive even in conditions where other internal organs, you know, muscles and guts and brains and so on, will disappear," says Benton.

That created the possibility of learning something about what colors could be found in the primitive feathers of early birds and recently discovered feathered dinosaurs.

"These dark stripes, as far as we can tell, were exclusively ginger, and so this early dinosaur with its long thin tail had ginger and white stripes up the tail," says Benton.

He says they assume the tail must have been completely covered with primitive feathers, with alternating orange-brown and white stripes. The white feathers would not have contained any melanin capsules, which means they would have had less structural strength and would have decayed rather than being preserved in the fossil.

"For the first time ever, we have evidence, we believe fairly watertight evidence, of the original color," says Benton. …

The First Hints Of A Dinosaur's True Colors

Technorati Tags: biotechnology

Most people should not automatically opt for a swine flu shot, expert suggests based on bacterial decision-making

ScienceDaily (Dec. 17, 2009) — Bacteria inhabited our planet for more than 4 billion years before humans showed up, and they'll probably outlive us by as many eons more. That suggests they may have something to teach us.

New research from Tel Aviv University bacteria expert Prof. Eshel Ben-Jacob of the Raymond and Beverly Sackler School of Physics and Astronomy, grounded in the study of bacteria, presents compelling evidence to suggest there may be good reasons why most people should not automatically opt for the swine flu H1N1 shot.

In research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS), Prof. Ben Jacob uses the decision-making of bacteria, an analogue of "game theory," as a model to make his case.

"Unlike our health authorities, bacteria would never panic," he says. "Bacteria don't follow the media or watch cable news. Instead, they send chemical messages to each other -- in a colony 100 times larger than the earth's human population -- to make their decisions. And based on what we've seen in bacterial colonies, I know they would be suspicious committing to swine flu shots. They wouldn't opt for a colony wide vaccination," Prof. Ben Jacob concludes. …

Most people should not automatically opt for a swine flu shot, expert suggests based on bacterial decision-making

Technorati Tags: biotechnology

Bacteria engineered to turn carbon dioxide into liquid fuel

 

ScienceDaily (Dec. 11, 2009) — Global climate change has prompted efforts to drastically reduce emissions of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas produced by burning fossil fuels.

In a new approach, researchers from the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science have genetically modified a cyanobacterium to consume carbon dioxide and produce the liquid fuel isobutanol, which holds great potential as a gasoline alternative. The reaction is powered directly by energy from sunlight, through photosynthesis.

The research appears in the Dec. 9 print edition of the journal Nature Biotechnology and is available online.

This new method has two advantages for the long-term, global-scale goal of achieving a cleaner and greener energy economy, the researchers say. First, it recycles carbon dioxide, reducing greenhouse gas emissions resulting from the burning of fossil fuels. Second, it uses solar energy to convert the carbon dioxide into a liquid fuel that can be used in the existing energy infrastructure, including in most automobiles. …

Bacteria engineered to turn carbon dioxide into liquid fuel

Technorati Tags: biotechnology,biofuel,carbon dioxide,global warming,climate change

Scientists crack sustainable plastics puzzle

By Tom Young, BusinessGreen, Tuesday 24 November 2009 at 00:15:00

A team of South Korean scientists have produced the polymers used in conventional plastics through bio-engineering processes, in a breakthrough that promises to significantly cut the cost of so-called bioplastics.

The technique could allow the production of environmentally friendly plastics that are fundamentally the same as conventional plastics, but are biodegradable and do not use oil during their manufacture.

The research focused on polylactic acid (PLA), a bio-based polymer which can be used as an alternative to petroleum-based polymers to produce plastic.

"The polyesters and other polymers we use everyday are mostly derived from fossil oils made through the refinery or chemical process," professor Sang Yup Lee, who led the research, said in a statement.

"The idea of producing polymers from renewable biomass has attracted much attention due to the increasing concerns of environmental problems and the limited nature of fossil resources. PLA is considered a good alternative to petroleum-based plastics, as it is both biodegradable and has a low toxicity to humans," he added.

Until now, PLA has been produced in a two-step fermentation and chemical process of polymerisation, which is both complex and expensive. …

Scientists crack sustainable plastics puzzle

Technorati Tags: biotechnology,biomass

Uracil made in the lab under simulated space conditions

NASA scientists studying the origin of life have reproduced uracil, a key component of our hereditary material, in the laboratory. They discovered that an ice sample containing pyrimidine exposed to ultraviolet radiation under space-like conditions produces this essential ingredient of life.

Pyrimidine is a ring-shaped molecule made up of carbon and nitrogen and is the basic structure for uracil, part of a genetic code found in ribonucleic acid (RNA). RNA is central to protein synthesis, but has many other roles.

"We have demonstrated for the first time that we can make uracil, a component of RNA, non-biologically in a laboratory under conditions found in space," said Michel Nuevo, research scientist at NASA's Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif. "We are showing that these laboratory processes, which simulate occurrences in outer space, can make a fundamental building block used by living organisms on Earth."

Scientists tested their hypotheses in the Ames Astrochemistry Laboratory. During their experiment, they exposed the ice sample containing pyrimidine to ultraviolet radiation under space-like conditions, including a very high vacuum, extremely low temperatures (approximately - 340 degrees Fahrenheit), and harsh radiation.

They found that when pyrimidine is frozen in water ice, it is much less vulnerable to destruction by radiation. Instead of being destroyed, many of the molecules took on new forms, such as the RNA component uracil, which is found in the genetic make-up of all living organisms on Earth.

“We are trying to address the mechanisms in space that are forming these molecules. Considering what we produced in the laboratory, the chemistry of ice exposed to ultraviolet radiation may be an important linking step between what goes on in space and what fell to Earth early in its development,” said Stefanie Milam, a researcher at NASA Ames and a co-author of the research paper. …

Uracil Made in the Lab

Technorati Tags: space exploration,biotechnology

Map of human bacterial diversity shows wide interpersonal differences

ScienceDaily (Nov. 6, 2009) — A University of Colorado at Boulder team has developed the first atlas of bacterial diversity across the human body, charting wide variations in microbe populations that live in different regions of the human body and which aid us in physiological functions that contribute to our health.

The study showed humans carry "personalized" communities of bacteria around that vary widely from our foreheads and feet to our noses and navels, said CU-Boulder's Rob Knight, senior author on the paper published in the Nov. 6 issue of Science Express. The researchers found unexpectedly wide variability in bacterial communities from person to person in the study, which included nine healthy volunteers and which targeted 27 specific sites on the body.

"This is the most complete view we have yet of the microbial side of ourselves, one that our group and others will be adding to over the coming years," said Knight an assistant professor in CU-Boulder's chemistry and biochemistry department. "The goal is to find out what is normal for a healthy person, which will provide a baseline for further studies to look at people with diseased states. One of the biggest surprises was how much variation there was from person to person in a healthy group of subjects."

Co-authors on the Science Express study, the online version of the journal Science, included CU-Boulder's Elizabeth Costello, Christian Lauber, Micah Hamady and Noah Fierer, as well as Jeffrey Gordon from the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

There are an estimated 100 trillion microbes residing on and within each human being that are thought to collectively endow us with the essential traits we rely on for a variety of functions, including the proper development of our immune systems, efficient digestion of key foods and resistance to invasion by lurking microbial pathogens.

The CU-Boulder team looked high and low, analyzing microbial communities in places such as hair on the head, ear canals, nostrils, mouth, lower intestine, and 18 different skin sites ranging from foreheads and armpits, forearms, palms, index fingers, navels, the back of the knees and the soles of the feet. The team used the latest generation of massively parallel DNA sequencers and new computational tools developed at CU-Boulder. …

Map Of Human Bacterial Diversity Shows Wide Interpersonal Differences

Technorati Tags: biotechnology

Free-flying cyborg insects steered from a distance

A live beetle with electrodes wired up to its nervous system can made to take off and be steered like a remote-controlled aircraft

by Ewen Callaway

It's tempting to call them lords of the flies. For the first time, researchers have controlled the movements of free-flying insects from afar, as if they were tiny remote-controlled aircraft.

By connecting electrodes and radio antennas to the nervous systems of beetles, the researchers were able to make them take off, dive and turn on command. The cyborg insects were created at the University of California, Berkeley, by engineers led by Hirotaka Sato and Michel Maharbiz as part of a programme funded by the Pentagon's Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).

The project's goal is to create fully remote-controlled insectsMovie Camera able to perform tasks such as looking for survivors after a disaster, or acting as the ultimate spy.

The Berkeley team implanted electrodes into the brain and muscles of two species: green June beetles called Cotinus texana from the southern US, and the much larger African species Mecynorrhina torquata. Both responded to stimulation in much the same way, but the weight of the electronics and their battery meant that only Mecynorrhina – which can grow to the size of a human palm – was strong enough to fly freely under radio control. …

Free-flying cyborg insects steered from a distance

Technorati Tags: biotechnology,cybernetic organism

Amazing designs built with living trees

Here’s an idea for environmentally friendly, carbon-absorbing architecture and design: structures and sculptures built with living trees.

A concept sometimes called arborsculpture, the idea is based on bending and sometimes grafting together young trees to form useful shapes and structures such as stools, tables, benches and even houses. One of the earliest known practitioners of the craft was an American named John Krubsack, who harvested his grown chair in 1914.  In some cultures, the idea goes even further, by centuries, back.

Today, a number of people and companies are promoting arborsculpture as a green way to create functional, carbon-sequestering items and homes. Among the designs created with living trees:

Tree stool

Briton Christopher Cattle calls his designs “grown furniture” and says, “Growing furniture isn’t going to save the planet, but it can show that it’s possible to create genuinely useful things without adding to the pollution that industry inevitably seems to produce.”

Tree hut

“Arbosculptor” Richard Reames not only creates a variety of  items using living trees, but has written two books on the subject, including Arborsculpture: Solutions for a Small Planet. Among the living structures he highlights on his Website, Arborsmith Studios, is a grown gazebo located in a park on Okinawa. …

Amazing designs built with living trees

Technorati Tags: green construction,biotechnology

Microfluidic chip does 1,000 parallel chemical reactions, looks glorious

 

We'd never considered a career in biochemistry until we saw this wild beast of a chemical microprocessor. Microfluidic chips, used to test chemical reactions and properties, have been known to be smaller, but they've never before been quite this powerful. The result of a joint study between California State University, UCLA and China's Wuhan University, the "integrated microfluidic device" is capable of performing 1,024 in situ chemical reactions at a time, making the researcher's life, oh, about 1,024 times easier. Most importantly though, costly enzymes previously used for a single test can now be split up into hundreds and tested simultaneously, which should pave the way for exponentially faster and easier medical research. It's not clear when these will be widely available, but we're sure PhDs around the world are trying to order one as we speak. …

Microfluidic chip does 1,000 parallel chemical reactions, looks glorious

Technorati Tags: biochemistry

Growing trees into chic, living chairs

 

Image via Yanko Design

If you're not so into hugging trees, how about taking a seat on one? Swiss designer Michel Bussien has designed a new way to help you get up close and personal with nature--by turning it into furniture. The "Growing Chair" shown is a sharply designed mold that allows you to turn greenery into a chic seat. ...

Growing Trees Into Chic, Living Chairs

Technorati Tags: biotechnology,green architecture

Fundamental mechanism for cell organization discovered

 

Scientists have discovered that cells use a very simple phase transition -- similar to water vapor condensing into dew -- to assemble and localize subcellular structures that are involved in formation of the embryo.

The discovery, which was made during the 2008 Physiology course at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL), is reported in the May 21 early online edition of Science by Clifford P. Brangwynne and Anthony A. Hyman of the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Dresden, Germany, and their colleagues, including Frank Jülicher of the Max Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems, also in Dresden.

Working with the worm C. elegans, the scientists found that subcellular structures called P granules, which are thought to specify the "germ cells" that ultimately give rise to sperm or eggs, are liquid droplets that transition between a dissolved or condensed state. In newly fertilized one-cell embryos, the P granules are dissolving throughout the cell, like water droplets at high temperature. But prior to the first cell division, the P granules rapidly condense at one end of the cell, as if the temperature were suddenly lowered there. The progenitor germ cell subsequently forms where the P granules have condensed.

"This kind of phase transition could potentially be working for many other subcellular structures similar to P granules," Brangwynne says. P granules are ribonucleoprotein assemblies (RNPs), and a given cell may contain dozens of different types of RNPs.

"It is interesting to think about this in the context of evolution and the origin of life," he says. "What we have found is that, in some cases, simple physical-chemical mechanisms, such as a classic phase transition, give rise to subcellular structure…This is likely the kind of thing that happened in the so-called primordial soup; but it's not surprising that even highly evolved cells continue to take advantage of such mechanisms." …

Fundamental Mechanism For Cell Organization Discovered

Technorati Tags: nanotechnology,biotechnology

MIT completes virus-built nanomachine battery

When we watch science fiction, deep in our heart many of us believe that’s how it will remain, a fiction. But few refuse to believe that and turn science fiction into reality. Angela Belcher and her team of bioengineers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) belong to the second category. They have turned virus-built battery into a reality. Their efforts have not yielded instant result. They have been working on this theory for the past five years. They were concentrating their efforts on a virus known as M13 bacteriophage that are harmless to humans.

YouTube: Virus Battery | More Videos

The main advantage of this M13 bacteriophage is that it is attracted to inorganic materials. Each virus can be coated with gold and cobalt oxide and that transforms it into a scrap of nanowire. When we combine these viruses in chain-like fashion, they form a film that can act as anode or the part of a battery that carries a negative ionic charge. This feat was achieved almost three years ago. The battle was half won. We all know that negative and positive ions are needed to form a functional battery. How does battery work? The first requirement is to charge a battery. Charging a battery requires flow of ions from the negatively-charged anode to the positively-charged cathode. Another important aspect is to discharge a battery. For that we need the flow in the opposite direction to “discharge” that electricity through laptops, mobile phones, and other such devices.

MIT team’s next effort was directed towards developing a cathode. They have used viruses that would be attracted to iron phosphate and carbon nanotubes (cylindrical carbon molecules frequently used in nanotechnology). This way they have created a highly conductive substance whose weight is negligible. After creating anode and cathode successfully, they have generated a micro-battery capable of around 100 charges. The prototype took this model and inflated it to the size of a button cell battery which powers a simple LED. …

MIT Completes Virus-Built Nanomachine Battery

Technorati Tags: nanotechnology,biotechnology

Washington biotech company working to save bamboo and save the planet

Bamboo products have exploded in the market recently. Bamboo is being used in flooring, textiles and all sorts of household items. Its popularity is based on its reputation as a sustainable material. It's a hardy plant that can thrive without the use of pesticides and in many climates and it grows quickly, so what is cut down can be easily replaced. At least that's what has been assumed.

It turns out that bamboo's popularity has led to it being over-harvested and not only is it not being replaced quickly enough with new growth, but many species are on the verge of extinction. Even though it grows quickly, turns out it's very hard to propagate from seeds. That's where Booshoot Gardens, a biotechnology company, comes in. They have figured out a way to propagate bamboo species through tissue culture and are cultivating various species in mass amounts in their greenhouses in Washington state. …

Biotech Company Working to Save Bamboo and Save the Planet

Technorati Tags: biotechnology