Uranium Eating Bacteria Help Cold War Cleanup

Shipud writes "Scientists from UMA have used metal-metablozing bacteria, Geobacter, to "eat" uranium. The uranium is converted from a soluble form to an insoluble one, thus preventing water contamination. Cold-war era uranium processing has left many contaminated sites in the US, and worldwide. Details are here."

Comments

Re:Radioactivity vs. Toxicity

[KnightNavro]

You're probably correct; the bugs are there to get rid of U because it's toxic. I did my senior design project on U removal from drinking water. The stuff poses a much greater threat as a heavy metal than as a radioactive atom when injected. The microbes wouldn't do anything to the atomic structure of the atoms, and hence do nothing to reduce radiation, but making it insoluble removes it from drinking water and makes it less mobile.

Of course, I said pretty much the same thing when the story was run two months ago.