Cleaning Up In High Level Radiation with Microbes

geomon writes "Research conducted by the US Department of Energy's (DOE) Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) is featured on the DOE's Office of Science web site. PNNL's work with the Deinococcus radiodurans microbe is featured on the Office of Scienceweb site in the article Radiation Resistant 'Superbug' May Be Used in Cleanup of Radioactive Contaminants." I've read about this before - this article does a good job of bringing the latest advances together.

Comments

Re:Great, then what?

[NecroPuppy]

So they have this nifty beastie that eats radioactive material.

No, they've got a neat little microbe that eats lactate, as mentioned in the article. What the microbe does is:

enzymatically reduce radionuclides and metal contaminants in the absence of air.

What waste products are left behind?

The radioactive particles are concentrated into a less mobile form which is more easily collected for disposal.

What does it eat once it runs out of radioactive goo?

It doesn't 'eat' the radioactive particles. The lacate it eats is applied to the contaminated area. Then the microbe is released into the area. As the microbe eats the lactate, the radioactive particles (plutonium, uranium, etc) are concentrated into "relatively insoluble and immobile forms".