Bacteria Can Build Nanowires

Roland Piquepaille writes "Researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) have discovered that under certain conditions, some very common bacteria can form nanowires. These bacteria were able to produce nanowires as small as 10 nanometers in diameter, but which can reach hundreds of microns in length. What is interesting here is that these nanowires are electrically conductive ones. This means that bacteria could be used to build microbial fuel cells or bacteria-powered batteries. As one researcher said, 'Earth appears to be hard-wired.'"

Comments

I hate to point this out

[perrin5]

Because it's the opposite of what slashdot usually does...

This has been around for at least a year, and the first group to find it was NOT PNL. It was Derek Lovely.

OH WAIT!!! Here's the original story:
http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/08/0 9/0348241

The difference here is that they have shown that the wires are conductive, and carbon based. This too is something that has been worked on for a while.