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.

Re:Cool

[ColaMan]

Hey , maybe you should drop the researchers a note about that. I'm sure they haven't thought of that yet.

Thank You Captain Obvious ;-)

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

Re:Gold, silver, etc.?

[Kevin Burtch]

Actually, yes.

Re:Gold, silver, etc.?

[Colymbosathon ecplec]

Here are a couple more articles: "Alaska Bugs Sweat Gold Nuggets", and "Domesticating the Gold Bugs, and the Copper Bugs Too" so it's not really new.

Note to self...

[FFFish]

...sell all copper mining stocks Monday morning.

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

Dont infect my computer

[samjam]

One of the last things I want in relation to this is a load of bacteria eating the copper tracks off my motherboard, and speads down the LAN wiring to other PC's.

Gosh, just imagine if a power station gets infected.

Sam

Someone had to..

[MaynardJanKeymeulen]

I for one welcome our new copper-eating...

It doesn't eat copper, it just accumulates it

[Chemisor]

It doesn't eat copper, it just accumulates it. This means that it can only absorb copper ions that are already dissolved, even if only in low concentration. If such bacteria got onto your motherboard, the effect would be cleansing, rather than destructive.

Reaction rate?

[cagle_.25]

Not mentioned in the article is how quickly the bacteria do their job. The sister project mentioned here:

Codelco also has a joint venture with BHP Billiton called Alliance Copper Limited, which uses another form of bioleaching to produce 20,000 tons a year of copper cathodes at a pilot plant in northern Chile.

seems a bit modest considering that US production of copper alone exceeds 1.5M metric tons

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.

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.

Error in story

[barakn]

meckardt writes "Using biological processes to retrieve metals from a subtrate has been at best a topic of science fiction."

Bacteria have been used in the copper and iron mining industries for a long time, especially for the sulfide ores. There's a diagram in the 6th edition (1991) of Biology of Microorganisms by Brock and Madigan, p. 650, of the microbial leaching of copper sulfide minerals. Water containing a ferric sulfate solution is dribbled over a pile of copper sulfide ore. Using oxygen or ferric iron and water, bacteria oxidize the copper into the soluble Cu2+, with ferrous iron, water and sulfate as byproducts. The water moves to a non-biological stage where the Cu2+ is reduced to metal by reacting with iron scrap metal. The iron is oxidized to the soluble ferrous form. In the last stage, another microbe, Thiobacillus ferrooxidans, oxidizes the ferrous ions to ferric ions, and the ferric sulfate solution is pumped back to the top of the hill (occasionally sulfuric acid is added).

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:how about some medicine

[barakn]

No. First, a leached metal becomes soluble (I doubt the metal is locked up in some mineral in the body waiting to be leached anyway), meaning it would be free to float through the body and cause more damage. Second, bacteria in the blood cause septic shock, which can be fatal. Any antibiotic related to penecillin will destroy bacterial cell walls, lysing the cells (and releasing bacterial toxins). If you were hoping the bacteria would sponge up the metals, dosing them with antibiotics would just release the metals. And are silicon and zinc heavy metals? I don't think so.