U of A team building a better bacterium

October 22, 2007 - Edmonton - A group of University of Alberta students have spent the summer working on building a new kind of bacteria - one that might hold some answers to the planet's diminishing supply of fossil fuels.

The team members - who call themselves the Buta-nerds - have been working on a way to create an organism that will produce butanol fuel for an annual competition hosted by MIT. The International Genetically Engineered Machine competition invites researchers from all over the world to address the question, "Can simple biological systems be built from standard, interchangeable parts and operated in living cells?"

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• University
• of
• Alberta
• Edmonton
• Canada
• research
• MIT
• international
• genetically
• engineered
• machine
• competition
• team
• butanol

[MaxwellEngineer]

1:03, love how he sniffed it. Great scientific method, lol!

[agentgooner007]

@TurboDally Sorry to comment on such an old post but the word bacteria comes from a greek word meaning "small staff" (they knew back then what thet did) and this process was first done in France in 1861 (abe process) and was common industry untill the late 50's so there is nothing new apart from the scary GM bit.

[TurboDally]

Hmm can they make bacteria that digest CFCs? Maybe even break down some of the toxic material in the environment? Might be a nice idea, using bacteria to work for us :) Genious :)

[fjalicecream]

so how'd it turn out? did you guys accomplish what you set out to do? I really hope so cuz i'm looking to buy some Butanol for my dirtbike, which is brand spanking new but i haven't ridden not even once cuz i don't want to contribute CO2 or anything.

congrats to all and thank you for striving for Butanol! Go Butanerds!