Researchers Isolate Copper- Extracting Bacteria

meckardt writes "Using biological processes to retrieve metals from a subtrate has been at best a topic of science fiction. However, in today's news a Japanese-Chilean research firm reported a breakthrough in developing new technology that uses bacteria to extract copper from poor quality mineral at a low cost."

Comments

Cool

[Mark_MF-WN]

Cool -- if this research can extend to other minerals, it could represent a great way to extend existing mineral resources and recycle some types of waste.

Gold, silver, etc.?

[justanyone]

I don't suppose anyone is working on similar processes for Gold, Silver, and other precious metals?

Of course, having bacteria that handle any specific metals would be handy. As I remember, cadmium is used pretty heavily in chip fabs, and having a process to remediate it might be very nice for the environment near current and former fabs.

The important thing to me seems to be how the metals are accumulated. it does no good if a bacteria accumulates a metal if we cannot extract the bacteria from the water / substance afterwards...

-- Kevin J. Rice

This is Not New: Lots of Bacteria do this

[Salis]

There's quite a few species of bacteria that like to uptake metals and oxidize them for energy. In addition to copper, one major application is the absorption of heavy metals, such as uranium/etc, from the soil by bacteria. The bacteria are then much easier to remove from the soil than the heavy metals they absorbed.

Salis

Think bigger

[LuckyStarr]

This could be THE chance for bootstrapping an industry on extraterrestrial objects like the moon or the asteroids.

First isolate bacteria for extraction of other elements. If you have enough diversity take a small craft filled with bacteria and their life-support system which certainly isnt as big as one for humans. Then land the craft on the object and start mining and sorting out the elements.

Later send crafts to pick up that elements and produce something out of it. Perhaps first a larger scale mining operation, or a larger scale production facility.

Then construct all the other stuff. Dreaming... :)

Let's look at the next line.

[Eevee]

Commercial production will begin by 2007, according to Codelco.

Of course it's modest. Pilot plants aren't supposed to produce commercial levels of output. A pilot plant is basically a sanity check, where you find the mistakes and hidden problems in a new process before spending the cash to build a full-scale plant.

Plus, it's a bit strange to compare a single plant--pilot or production--to the output of an entire country.

hmm

[Chucklz]

I seem to remember an invention about a hundred or so years ago. It didn't put out as much light as the current gaslight technology, required a completely new , expensive, system to support it. But I guess the lightbulb worked out pretty well.

It depends on the cost.

[Eevee]

This process is designed to after the leftovers--the ore that isn't worth processing with the current technology. The company has already sunk a set amount of money into each mine for such things as buying the land and setting up the infrastructure; so even if this new process isn't all that productive it can still be cost effective.

Re:Reaction rate?

[tiger99]

It may be slow, but if it is low-cost, that may not matter. There is a place in the UK (Parys Mountain, Anglesey, North Wales) where they used to, until quite recently, precipitate copper from mine drainage water by using scrap iron, a very slow process. It cost very little and did eventually produce copper.

I suspect these bacteria would do the job more effectively. Now, for coal mine waste water, which is often excessively rich in iron, a suitable bacteria would do a better job than today's technology, however due to the low cost of iron, you would need to get enrichment to about 30% to be economically viable.

I know of places where lead and zinc need to be dealt with, there are always traces of other metals, especially silver.

We will be hearing more of this, I think.