WALNUT CREEK/BERKELEY, Calif.—For a pest that isn’t quite the size of a comma on a keyboard, the two-spotted spider mite can do a disproportionate amount of damage. These web-spinners extract the nutrients they need from leaves of more than a thousand different plant species, including bioenergy feedstocks and food staples. The cost of chemically controlling… [Read More]

WALNUT CREEK/BERKELEY, Calif.—From the North Pole to the Arctic Ocean, the frozen soils within this region keep an estimated 1,672 billion metric tons of carbon out of the Earth’s atmosphere. This sequestered carbon is more than 250 times the amount of greenhouse gas emissions attributed to the United States in the year 2009. As global… [Read More]

WALNUT CREEK, Calif.—According to roadside signs, the number of burgers served has eclipsed the billion mark, while the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Joint Genome Institute (JGI) will now serve up trillions of nucleotides of information from scores of newly-selected projects geared to feed the data-hungry worldwide research community. The 2012 Community Sequencing Program (CSP)… [Read More]

WALNUT CREEK, Calif.—The nation’s Renewable Fuels Standard calls for annual production of 36 billion gallons of biofuel by 2022. One of the biggest hurdles to achieving this goal lies in optimizing the multistep process involved in breaking down plant biomass and then converting it into fermentable sugars that can be refined into fuel for our… [Read More]

WALNUT CREEK, Calif.—Susannah Green Tringe of the DOE Joint Genome Institute (DOE JGI) has been named one of 2011’s “Brilliant 10,” the annual list compiled by Popular Science magazine of top young researchers. In adding her name to the list, which appears in the October issue, the magazine recognized her $2.5 million grant from the… [Read More]

WALNUT CREEK, Calif.—Understanding the flow and processing of carbon in the world’s oceans, which cover 70 percent of Earth’s surface, is central to understanding global climate cycles, with many questions remaining unanswered. Between 200 and 1,000 meters below the ocean surface exists a “twilight zone” where insufficient sunlight penetrates for microorganisms to perform photosynthesis. Despite… [Read More]

WALNUT CREEK, Calif.—Feared by realtors and homeowners alike, dry rot due to the fungus Serpula lacrymans causes millions of dollars worth of damage to homes and buildings around the world. This brown rot fungus’ capacity to break down the cellulose in wood led to its selection for sequencing by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)… [Read More]

WALNUT CREEK, Calif.—Carbon dioxide may be the most name-dropped greenhouse gas, but methane is 20 times more potent. In 2009, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency calculated that 20 percent of the nation’s human-related methane emissions were attributable to livestock digestive processes. In Australia, livestock emissions account for 12 percent of the country’s total greenhouse gas… [Read More]

WALNUT CREEK, Calif.—In order to realize the full potential of advanced biofuels that are derived from non-food sources of lignocellulosic biomass—e.g., agricultural, forestry, and municipal waste, and crops such as  poplar, switchgrass and miscanthus—new technologies that can efficiently and cost-effectively break down this biomass into simple sugars are required. Existing biomass pretreatment technologies are typically… [Read More]

WALNUT CREEK, Calif.—Fungi play key roles in nature and are valued for their great importance in industry. Consider citric acid, a key additive in several foods and pharmaceuticals produced on a large-scale basis for decades with the help of the filamentous fungus Aspergillus niger. While A. niger is an integral player in the carbon cycle,… [Read More]