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Rainforest Fungus Synthesizes Diesel
Fluffeh alerts us to a report of a fungus that naturally produces diesel fuel, or something very close to it. "A fungus that lives inside trees in the Patagonian rain forest naturally makes a mix of hydrocarbons that bears a striking resemblance to diesel, biologists announced today. And the fungus can grow on cellulose, a major component of tree trunks, blades of grass and stalks that is the most abundant carbon-based plant material on Earth. ... [T]the paper's authors admit that the technique is far from any sort of industrial production. 'This report presents no information on the cost-effectiveness or other details to make G. roseum an alternative fuel source,' they write." NPR has an interview with the fungus's discoverer.
Most Slashdotters' faces produce copious amounts of oil.
I think it would be really poetic if the first use of this fungus is to digest the entire Patagonian rain forest into sweet, greasy diesel.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
What's the difference between G. Roseum and an oil baron?
One is a parasitic inhuman slime capable of producing copius amounts of fuel, and the other is a mushroom.
I am the richest astronaut ever to win the superbowl.
When we looked at the gas analysis, I was flabbergasted," said Gary Strobel, a plant scientist at Montana State University
So it's not producing diesel, but some fuel called "Flabbergas"
AT&ROFLMAO
What, 20 replies now, and not a single variation on "There is a real energy crisis, we have to focus on fixing it! Oil doesn't grow on trees! Wait, what now? Oh. ..."
Those who fail to understand communication protocols, are doomed to repeat them over port 80.
Just one step closer to Douglas Adams' statement that, in such a large Universe, most things one could possibly imagine (and a lot one would rather not), grow somewhere.
I marked him troll. I am a wahabbi living in venezuela, and I summer in Russia where I volunteer for the local young men's neoimperialism association (YMNA). I was upset by the "blowhard" comment, but what really stung was the implication that I didn't deserve all the billions I've been getting.
Not to mix a joke with a serious point, but his point number two of "put them in a plant that expresses the diesel in an easily harvested format" seems a bit off. The genes take cellulose and break it down, wheras plants make the cellulose to make themselves. It would probably be rather inefficient to have the plants digest themselves. I think it would be easier to come up with a culture system to feed non-foodstock plant material into bacteria engineered to digest the cellulose.
What would be truly a shoe-in for a nobel would be if you could engineer a 2 microbe system, one to make cellulose from photosynthesis, the other to digest the cellulose, either in tandem to continuously produce fuel or after some harvesting. Naturally I have no idea as to the feasibility of any part of that, so don't blame me if you you're a venture capitalist and this idea goes nowhere. ;-)
The last time someone did this, the biomass of the entire planet was dissolved into great big pools of oil that we are still using today.
Too bad it doesn't run on cellulite, that would solve America's energy problems for millenia.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Who needs fungus. Bodies burn just fine.
Soylent Green is PEOPLE!!!
I couldn't resist.
He can't afford the Sixpack due to the increase in gas prices.
The humans are dead, already.
"Little is much when little you need."