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Skies of blue: Recycling carbon emissions to useful chemicals and reducing global warming: Researchers optimize a novel process for the efficient conversion of carbon emissions into useful chemicals like acetate using microbes
Researchers optimize a novel process for the efficient conversion of carbon emissions into useful chemicals like acetate using microbes
www.sciencedaily.com
Rapid global urbanization has dramatically changed the face of our planet, polluting our atmosphere with greenhouse gases and causing global warming. It is the need of the hour to control our activities and find more sustainable alternatives to preserve what remains of our planet for the generations to come.
Carbon dioxide (CO2) and carbon monoxide (CO) make up a large proportion of industrial flue gases. Recent research has shown that certain microorganisms are capable of metabolizing these gases into useful by-products. Thus, attempts are now being directed to using microbes to recycle these gases and convert them into useful chemicals in a process known as 'carbon capture and utilization' (CCU). This is a step beyond the current widespread practice of 'carbon capture and storage' (CCS). However, such CCU requires high energy input making the scaling up of this process difficult and expensive. How can this process then be optimized for maximum output?
A team of researchers from Korea, led by Prof. Jung Rae Kim from Pusan National University, have answered this question for a newer CCU system called the bioelectrochemical system (BES). Prof. Kim explains, "We have developed a 'bioelectrosynthetic process' in which electroactive bacteria convert CO/CO2 into useful metabolites like acetate and volatile fatty acids using electricity as the reducing power." The scientists were able to optimize BESs to increase their efficiency by 2 to 6 times that of current systems for CO gas. Their findings are published in Bioresource Technology since January 2021.
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Great concept. I hope they can commercialize it.