Bio-Based Ideas

As reported by Greentechmedia on September 28th, Phoenix-based Rosestreet Labs Energy (RSLE) has successfully tested a new prototype of solar panels able to convert between 25-30% of sunlight into electricity. For comparison, the current maximum for conventional silicon-based solar panel is produced by SunPower can convert around 22.5% of sunlight into electricity. So the increases by RSLE represent a quantum leap in efficiency increases. The efficiency gains come at a cost of increased production costs. RSLE aims to lower production cost to below $ 1.50 per Watt by 2014 which is a goal already achieved by some solar panel manufacturers today. RSLE claims to achieve this feat by combining silicon-based solar technology with other nitride-based alloys - in this case indium and gallium. The combination of silicon and indium and gallium nitride can make use of a broader spectrum of the visible light resulting in higher efficiencies. According to a 2005 press release , unlike conventi...

Prolog: It has been a while since last I discussed a scientific journal paper. The following post is based on a paper published in the American Chemical Society NANO Journal (Vol.2, No. 10, pp 2103-2112) with the title “Metabolic Insertion of Nanostructured TiO2 into the Patterned Biosilica of the Diatom Pinnulario sp. by a Two-Stage Bioreactor Culvtivation Process”. What have they done? The Rorrer lab is a nanotechnology/biotechnology engineering lab. They manipulate various microorganisms so that the microorganisms produce substances that are of use to human kind. Their latest series of publications has focused on diatoms which are single-celled algae that are able to make silica shells with very intricate patterns (see below). The Rorrer lab has a significant body of work inducing a particular diatom by the name of Pinnulario sp . to incorporate optoelectronic substances into its frustules (outer shells) that it normally would not. Optoelectronic substances can transform, tra...

In the last focus section , we discussed how algae can be used to treat waste waters and mitigate CO2 in the process. Today's post will explore how algae can be used for energy generation. As already mentioned in the last time, biofuels have become very visible as of late due to environmental, economical and geopolitcal reasons. If at the heart of traditional biofuel generation lies in the creation and decomposition of biomass, then it would be easy to substitute corn or other less controversial land-based plants with algae. Although a lot of attention is paid to the use of algae in biofuel generation, and this article also mainly focusses on this aspect, it should be noted that algae can also be used to generate electricity by direct combustion of the biomass. Plans for these kinds of schemes are already on the way in Venice and a few other European locations [1]. Algae and Biofuels What happens to the biomass after it has been created depends on the type of biofuel that is de...

Introduction With prices for crude oil spiking in the recent past, and an unstable Middle East and intensifying effects of climate disruptions, the Obama administration and governments around the world have been promoting the development, and deployment of newer, more sustainable forms of energy generation, amongst which are biofuels . What are Biofuels? At the heart of every hydrocarbon based fuel (gasoline, diesel, kerosene, coal) are anaerobic degradation processes of organic material. For fossil fuels , the source of organic material comes from planctonic life, plants, and animals that lived and died millions of years ago. For biofuels, the source of organic material comes from planctonic life, plants or other sources of much more recent origin. The important concepts to note are: 1.) Building up organic matter removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. 2.) Burning hydrocarbon based fuels releases the carbon originally tied up in the form of carbon dioxide. So when we pump up t...

I am still working on the second part of the focus on algae, and between research, and moving to a new place, I am not finding just enough time to flesh out the article just yet. It will come though! Instead tonight, I wanted to write an informal entry on a particular aspect of "bio-based" ideas: what anyone can do for environmental protection and conservation. In most of the industrialized world and beyond, internet access is pervasive. I find that I am spending quite a bit of time on the internet be it for email, searching information, social networking or gaming. I am sure others will have their own habits on the internet. It's easy to forget that each action on the internet actually has an environmental cost associated with it. The computers used to read this blog use electricity. Games can be demanding on the graphics card which if high-end can use even more energy than the CPU itself. Beyond the borders of your own computer, each action one takes puts a certain work...

After spending the last few blog posts on different aspects of dissimilatory bacteria , I want to switch the focus to a different class of organisms I have been interested in for a long time now. These are the algae. Algae comprise a large diversity of "sea weeds" and an even larger variety of single-celled organisms that mostly are capable of doing photosynthesis. They include the ordinary sea-weed, and make up a portion of the green slime found around the edges and the bottom of a pond. More exotic types of algae can live symbiotically - that is together with another organism in a mutually beneficial way. Lichens are an example of symbiotic relationship between algae and fungi. More information about the evolution and lineage of algae can be found in this wiki article . Image via Wikipedia Typically, these organisms are either not mentioned at all or only in conjunction with toxic algal blooms. But lately, algae, of course, have been in the news recently because of the p...

In the last part, we covered a important way of how bacteria communicate to each other through quorum sensing . The LuxI-LuxR system describes an interesting signaling system used by bacteria of the same species. Professor Bassler's laboratory is especially known for her work on autoinducer 2 (AI-2) system which allows for inter-species communication. The discovery of AI-2, and its fundamental workings were a true scientific detective stories with twists and turns, and its implications are still being researched today. Work on a different luminescent marine bacterium, Vibrio harveyi , revealed that regulatory apparatus for creating luminescent was more complex. It relied on two separate input signals: AI-1 and AI-2 which were recogized by two membrane spanning receptor kinases LuxQ and LuxN respectively. How AI-1 and AI-2 are involved for luminescence may be less important here except to say that both signals need to be present. While more information could be inferred about AI...