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C&EN covers microbiomes for biofuels development

Any new technology that emerges from animal microbiome mining would need to improve upon the proprietary enzyme systems already in companies’ arsenals. For example, enzyme company Novozymes is already marketing cellulase enzymes from Trichoderma reesei, a fungus originally discovered because it was degrading cotton military uniforms and canvas tents in the South Pacific during World War… [Read More]

The poplar genome’s impact, a decade on

During his keynote speech at the DOE Joint Genome Institute’s Annual Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting, science writer Carl Zimmer discussed the status of personalized medicine following the completion of the Human Genome Project. In an article published online October 25, 2012 in Tree Physiology, researchers including Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Jerry Tuskan present a similar… [Read More]

Bioscriber, an online synthetic biology tutorial, debuts

Developed as a means of introducing the concept of DNA synthesis/synthetic biology to the general public and how it is used at the U.S. Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute (DOE JGI) and the Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI) for biofuels research, Bioscriber debuted on October 13, 2012 at the Berkeley Lab Open House.  The initial… [Read More]

Revisiting the importance of studying the microbes in termite guts

According to Leadbetter, the termite holds the key to unlocking all of this potential. But understanding how to do it won’t be easy.People have enlisted the help of microbes before, but never with this degree of complexity. “For 6,000 years,” he said, “we’ve been making beer, wine and bread using yeast,” which is a single-cell… [Read More]

Fungal genomics and coal formation in The Green Optimistic

White rot fungi from the class of fungi known as Agaricomycetes are capable of degrading the polymer lignin. Lignin is found in plant tissues and is largely responsible for the rigid structure of plant cell walls. The researchers postulated that fungal degradation of lignin caused plant matter to be broken down into its basic components and… [Read More]

Fungal genomics and coal formation in Clean Technica

In an ironic twist, genomics researchers have stumbled upon an incredible discovery – the same ancestral fungus that ended coal formation millennia ago may now be able to boost biofuel and bioenergy production. Read more at Clean Technica [Read More]

Fungal genomics and coal formation in BioBased Digest

In Massachusetts, a group of 70 researchers led by David S. Hibbett of Clark University, in Worcester, Mass. and Igor V. Grigoriev of the Department of Energy’s Joint Genome Institute comparing the genomes of 31 fungi to determine how white rot fungi breaks down lignin and could be a major breakthrough in cellulosic ethanol technology. Read… [Read More]

On white rot, coal and biofuels in ClimateWire

The evolutionary rise of a common fungus — white rot — is responsible for the end of underground coal formation 60 million years ago, scientists say in a paper published last week in Science.Ironically, that same fungus could now be a key element to help the world move away from fossil fuels by helping to create… [Read More]

Some Enzymes Like it Hot

It sounds like a dream vacation: hang out in hot springs all day, converting sugar to alcohol. But that’s precisely what researchers are looking for in microbes to more efficiently break down plant matter into fermentable sugars for biofuel. And they found it in Dictyoglomus turgidum, in samples from Obsidian Hot Spring in Yellowstone National… [Read More]

Dekkera yeast project in Science Daily

The yeast Dekkera bruxellensis plays an important role in the production of wine, as it can have either a positive or a negative impact on the taste. Researchers at Lund University in Sweden, among others, have analyzed the yeast’s genome sequenced by the US Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute, giving wine producers the possibility to take… [Read More]