Scientists Want To Make Fuel And Plastic Out Of Bacteria
The scientists are still working out what this reason is, but their leading hypothesis—based in part on the work of team member and University of Auckland biologist Jane Allison—is that alkanes prevent the cyanobacteria’s cell walls from becoming large and rigid, which makes it difficult for the cells to split when the time comes to reproduce. Allison came to this conclusion based on experiments using a molecular modeling program called Gromacs, which lets her test how hydrocarbons and other molecules in the cyanobacteria’s cell walls interact on a chemical level. While the diesel-like alkanes are only produced by cyanobacteria, Lea-Smith’s team believes other microbes, including some yeast species, are producing a huge range of other hydrocarbons.
Source: www.hakaimagazine.com