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Breakthrough in Electricity-Producing Microbe
University of Massachusetts researchers have made a breakthrough with "Geobacter," a microbe that produces electric current from mud and wastewater. A conservative estimate puts the energy output increase at eight times that of the original organism, potentially allowing applications far beyond that of extracting electricity from mud. "Now, planning can move forward to design microbial fuel cells that convert waste water and renewable biomass to electricity, treat a single home's waste while producing localized power (especially attractive in developing countries), power mobile electronics, vehicles and implanted medical devices, and drive bioremediation of contaminated environments."
Obama calls for "regime change" in the Republic of Elbonia.
We're talking about a microbe that can turn bullshit into electricity? I suppose this is the one way that Congress will give power back to the people....
I am the richest astronaut ever to win the superbowl.
The Geobacter biofilm's "fortuitous" electron-transferring skill, the product of natural selection, suggested a pathway to Lovley - a way he might use selective pressure to increase its capacity to produce power. He and colleagues grew Geobacter as usual on a graphite electrode, providing acetate as food and allowing a colony to form the biologically active slime, or biofilm where electron transfer takes place across the nanowires. But for this new experiment they added a tiny, 400-millivolt "pushback" current in the electrode that forced Geobacter to press harder to get rid of its electrons.
The result of providing a more challenging environment, within five short months, Lovley notes, was evolution of a beefed-up microorganism that can press at least eight times more electric current across the electrode than the original strain. âoeI'm really happy with this outcome," the microbiologist notes. "It's exceptionally fast feedback to us and a very satisfying result." He adds, "I'm still a little amazed that they make electricity, but I'm happy to be exploring how to harness that ability. I'm sure there'll be applications developed in the future that we canâ(TM)t even envision right now."
That's halfway down in the article.
You should try reading things before you try to debunk them. The environment will be created to get the most electricity out of the little microbes, and probably sealed off and not thrown in the dirt. I imagine there may even be filters in place where the waste comes into make sure that any natural predators are weakened or killed to continue allowing the organisms to thrive.
And they have been studying this organism since 1987, and examining it for electrical production since 2002. I'm glad you're skeptical, but not glad that you're commenting on something you didn't even bother to read.
Some technical info and photos: http://www.geobacter.org/publications/19487117/