Cellulose: Promise and Peril

Published May 19th, 2009 in Plants. 4 Comments

As you may or may not know, in the last five or so years there’s been a major shift in thinking and policy on alternative fuels, particularly ethanol. Today, nearly all U.S. produced ethanol–gasoline made from plant material–is made from corn. Last year, U.S. ethanol producers made around 9 billion gallons. The problem, as has been well documented by the media, is that corn is also food. It may or may not be the case that corn-based ethanol raises the price of corn-based feed for cows and chickens and the price of any food that’s in any way dependent on corn (which is a lot of food). But, in some general sense, the food vs. fuel debate has been largely decided in favor of food.

Which is why, in the past few years, there’s been a major shift toward “cellulosic” ethanol–that is, biofuel made from non-edible plants. The federal government has earmarked billions of dollars for cellulosic ethanol research and development, meaning that scientists and entrepreneurs around the country are racing to figure out how to make fuel from switchgrass, corn stover and other plants we don’t eat.

There’s just one problem: it’s extremely difficult to extract cellulose from green plants, isolate its sugars, and ferment them into alcohol that can then be refined into biofuel. Think of it this way: for millions of years, plants have evolved to ward off insects, disease and other threats that want to break them down and siphon off their juice. That’s why cellulose is such a tough substance, composed of linked carbohydrates woven into a kevlar-like web meant to bolster and protect plant cells. (See the image above.) Scientists are literally battling against nature and millions of years of plant evolution to figure out how to break down cellulose into its constituent parts.

There’s been progress, but we’re still far, far away from the day when cornstalks and switchgrass will yield enough fuel at a reasonable cost to make a difference in the energy economy. And that’s not for a lack of effort. Scientists I spoke with at the University of Illinois and the University of Kentucky–Mark Crocker and Hans Blascheck, respectively–described dozens of projects involving new cellulosic biorefineries, more efficient ways to convert cellulose to fuel, ways to transport biomass from forests and other sites to refineries.

This work is happening all over the country. But the truth is that we’re only at the beginning of what will probably be a long, uncertain journey toward renewable fuels. I think we’ll get there, but it will take a while.

Algae Energy

Published May 12th, 2009 in Plants. 3 Comments

Could algae be a key to our energy future?

I ask because I’ve been talking with some folks in the alt energy industry recently, and algae kept coming up as “the next big thing.” Why? Because the trend in alternative liquid fuel these days is towards “cellulosic” biofuel, and algae is a highly attractive source of cellulose, for several reasons.

First, algae are some of the most abundant organisms on earth–they grown in fresh and salt water under a variety of conditions. All you need is a body of water, sunlight and nutrients, and algae will thrive.

Second, algae are consummate consumers of carbon dioxide. So they play an important role in scrubbing the atmosphere of excess CO2.

Third, and most importantly, algae produce “oil” that can be relatively easily refined into fuel for vehicles, including cars, trucks and airplanes. The problem with switchgrass and corn stover and other potential raw materials for cellulosic biofuel is that its difficult and expensive to break the cellulose down into its component sugars, then ferment the sugars into alcohol that can then be turned into fuel. With algae you can skip the fermentation process and go directly from collecting algae oil to processing it into fuel.

When I spoke with Jason Pyle, CEO of Sapphire Energy (an algae biofuel company), he explained that while cultivating algae as an energy crop presents some challenges, they’re not insurmountable. The main challenge, for Pyle, is one that farmers and agricultural scientists deal with routinely–finding ways to breed plants to make them as useful as possible for human consumption. Put another way, the main hurdle for algae energy scientists is to take a wild plant–algae–and tame it, so to speak, by breeding varieties that allow for optimal planting, growing, and harvesting. Some algae will grow anywhere but don’t produce much oil. Other types produce an abundance of oil but will only grow under certain very specific conditions. Pyle is working with different algae strains to create hybrids that will grow under a wide variety of conditions AND produce a lot of oil.

How close is Sapphire to being able to make fuel from algae? Pyle gave me a 3-5 year estimate. Academic scientists I spoke with were a bit more cautious, but agreed that algae is worth investigating, for the reasons mentioned above.

In the end, algae may or may not end up playing a role in the new energy economy. What’s important, it seems to me, is that scientists in industry and academe and government are trying–and working together–to explore new energy options.

Serial Killers, Rejoice

Published November 13th, 2008 in Bizarre. 3 Comments

I recently came across this weird and mildly disturbing headline in the current issues of Science News: “Household Cleaner Makes Blood Removal Simple!”

First, this reminded me of that old Tide commercial bragging that Tide laundry detergent is great for getting out grass stains, grease spots and blood stains, whereupon the commercial showed a shirt stained with blood. And then I thought of the old Seinfeld joke about this: if you’ve got a blood stain that big on your shirt, you’ve got more to worry about than finding the right detergent. (Tried to find a YouTube clip of the commercial and the Seinfeld bit, but no luck. Sorry.)

Anyhow, the SN article is pretty interesting. It describes how an “increasingly common household product” is so good at removing blood stains that it renders the blood undetectable by forensic tests. (The product isn’t mentioned by name. I assume that’s to prevent scientifically minded serial killers from getting any bright ideas.)

Beyond the “bizarre” factor, the piece is enlightening about forensic testing and why the cleaning product in question is able to foil even the most accomplished CSI pros.

Here’s the skinny. Human blood contains hemoglobin–an iron-rich substance the enables blood to deliver oxygen throughout the body. Iron is important for this story because of it’s oxygen-loving properties. When the CSI guys test for blood, they use a swab containing hydrogen peroxide, or H2O2. When the swab comes into contact with blood, the hemoglobin rips oxygen atoms from the the hydrogen peroxide swab, thereby telling the investigators that they have in fact found a blood stain. Even trace amounts of hemoglobin left over from a washed away blood stain will do the trick.

But the household cleaner in question is apparently able to entirely wipe away blood by swamping it with so much oxygen that the hemoglobin becomes saturated and doesn’t respond to CSI swabs.

The article makes sure to mention, though, that most murderers are too discombobulated too clean up after themselves or, presumably, to have been smart enough to test and purchase a cleaner capable to neutralizing hemoglobin.

Sports in Space

Published November 3rd, 2008 in Bizarre and Space. 1 Comment

We’re in the midst of a financial hornets’ nest, Afghanistan is still in turmoil, and the planet continues to warm. So, obviously, what we need during these troubled times are sports in space.

Thankfully, some of our best minds are working on this crucial sports in space initiative. Or, at least, a mind. Former NFL linebacker Ken Harvey, late of the Washington Redskins, made the sports page of the New York Times once again for his foray into space tourism. His “dream” is to create a game called “Float Ball” where players in zero or micro-gravity environments would float and bounce around while competing to shepherd colored balls to (through?) goals. Kind of like a combination of football, basketball, rugby and maybe Australian Rules Football. Or something like that.

If nothing else, Ken Harvey dreams big. He looks into the future and sees Float Ball on the moon, the International Space Station, even on Mars. I can’t wait. Sign me up now for a Float Ball fantasy league.

Seriously, though, Harvey’s idea has drawn some genuine interest. He’s partnered with Space Adventures–a company that aims to make space travel available to private citizens. (They’ve plunked several customers on the International Space Station, for a hefty fee.) And Harvey evidently spoke to a group of NASA engineers about his space sports vision.

Now, astronauts do require exercise in space. I’ve written about NASA initiatives to design training programs for astronauts on long missions … And there is a history of astronauts doing stuff like playing golf on the moon (boring the watch, actually). But there’s no precedent for full-fledged sports in space. Why? There’s the extreme cost, for one thing. And the lack of things that most sports depend on, like gravity, oxygen, large arenas or fields in/on which to play sports … the list goes on. In fact, staging a sporting event in space could lead to total disaster. Check out this video …

But still, there’s no harm in dreaming, I guess. And Harvey does have a website dedicated to what he calls “Space Sportilization.” Check it out and see for yourself.

The World’s Lifeboat

Published October 27th, 2008 in Bizarre. 1 Comment

In these days of panic and turmoil (financial, economic, environmental, military, political … take your pick) it’s good to know that there are people looking out for humanity’s best interests. More specifically, there’s an organization–The Lifeboat Foundation–that is dedicated to protecting the world from every possible threat–real or imagined.

I honestly can’t tell if the Lifeboat Foundation is legitimate or crackpot. Here’s the first paragraph of its mission statement:

“The Lifeboat Foundation is a nonprofit nongovernmental organization dedicated to encouraging scientific advancements while helping humanity survive existential risks and possible misuse of increasingly powerful technologies, including genetic engineering, nanotechnology, and robotics/AI, as we move towards a technological singularity.”

Two terms jump out here: “technological singularity” and “existential risks.” The first, according to the Wikipedia entry I read, has something to do with a futuristic scenario where machines become sentient and begin improving themselves, which would lead to greater machine intelligence and greater technological advancement in an ominous feedback loop beyond the ability of people to check or stop it. Sorta like the Terminator movies, I guess.

The second term, “existential risk,” refers, according to the Lifeboat Foundation website, to “a risk that is both global and terminal.” Such risks include a giant asteroid slamming into earth and destroying all life, nanotechnology gone wild, artificial intelligence run amok (i.e. evil robots taking over), global warming, black holes (man made and natural), nuclear holocaust, annihilation by an alien race, antimatter-based annihilation, and many more. Check out a full list of existential threats and LifeBoat Foundation programs meant to deal with them.

So … is this foundation for real? Or is it pure paranoia? It’s hard to tell because there’s smart, realistic stuff–global warming, asteroids–mixed in with the weird stuff. One the one hand, the Foundation’s President, Eric Klien, is a cryonicist (i.e. he’s involved in freezing dead bodies in the hopes that they can be revived and cured in some distant future) and was the brains behind The Atlantis Project–the goal of which was to create a “floating city” in the Caribbean Sea. (According to the Project’s website, it died from lack of interest.) In other words, the guy behind the Lifeboat Foundation is a utopianist given to championing global, pie-in-the-sky projects that have almost zero chance of coming to fruition.

On the other hand, the Foundation does seem to have convinced dozens and dozens of legitimate scientists and philosophers and thinkers to join its many advisory boards (31 total!). The majority of the members seem to have Ph.D.s (for what that’s worth) and a good number are professors at legitimate institutions of higher learning. But on yet another hand (I think we’re now on hand 3), any organization with that many advisory boards seems kinda fishy to me.

So what does the LifeBoat Foundation actually do? From what I can tell, it tries to raise money to finance its utopian plans, including creating an AI Shield (to ward off the killer robots), an Asteroid Shield, LifeShield Bunkers, NanoShield, Space Habitats and many more. (The Space Habitats program is actually pretty cool, if not exactly realistic at the moment. Go here for an very detailed overview of how humans might one day be relegated to living in orbiting space colonies.) So far, LF has raised a grand total of $398,435.61 to fund these ambitious projects.

So … I don’t really have a point here. I suppose my motivation is the EarthSky tries to be a clear voice for science, and part of that mission, to my mind, is calling attention to unclear voices.

(A short footnote about how I got onto this topic in the first place. As usual, I was searching the web for some bizarre science to blog about when I came across an article in New Scientist about how Intelligent Design apparatchicks are now targeting neuroscience as a new front in the battle against Evolution (the gist being, according to AI pundits, that there we have a “mind” that exists separately from the brain and that the mind is spiritual in nature and origin as opposed to being simply material). The article mentioned Mario Beauregard, a neuroscientist at the University of Montreal who spoke at a conference called “Beyond the Mind-Body Problem: New Paradigms in the Science of Consciousness.” When I looked into Beauregard, I saw that he’s a member of the Lifeboat Foundation. Once I started exploring the LF website, I got mesmerized by the sheer scope of its paranoid/utopian blend and decided to make it the topic of today’s post.)

Smelling Sounds, Hypnotically

Published October 22nd, 2008 in Bizarre and Body & Mind. 1 Comment

I saw an article today about how scientists at University College London have found that hypnosis can trigger synesthesia–a mingling of the sense, such as that you see the number 7 as red, for example, or “smell” sound of a hand clap–in people who are otherwise free of the condition.

It had previously been assumed that synaesthetes, as they’re called, have extra connections in their brains between areas controlling the various senses. But this new research suggests that, instead, synaesthetes simply brain pathways that are less inhibited than other people. To test the theory, the researchers put volunteers under hypnosis and were able to induce synaesthetic experiences. For example, some volunteers saw colored numbers on license plates. And volunteers who saw the number 7 as red weren’t able to identify a black 7 written on a board–a test commonly failed by synaesthetes.

I’ve written about synaesthesia before and I’ve also been amazed by the concept. The study I describe above doesn’t seem to have any practical and/or therapeutic uses. Synaesthesia isn’t normally a debilitating condition that one seeks to cure. I’ve read the synaesthesia may play a role in creative endeavors like painting, music and other art forms. In any case, since learning about this phenomenon, I’ve wished that I could experience it. Now, under hypnosis, maybe I can.

MUTE Music

Published October 16th, 2008 in Bizarre and Innovation. 2 Comments

This is cool. And weird.

What is? This sub headline from Science News: “New technology an make any surface–from a desk to a wall–sing.”

The story is about a team of Swiss scientists and artists (presumably including musicians) who’ve created a compute system using acoustic sensors (basically a camera and lasers) that can detect sound waves when you tap a wall or table or whatever and use that as a trigger to make the computer play a sound. (They call the system MUTE (Multi touch Everywhere) which seems like a very weird name for a sound-making device.) The cool part is that you can load the computer with any number of musical instrument sounds and also random stuff–hand claps, sneeze, belch, whatever.

Which leads to some interesting possibilities. For instance, you can supposedly program the computer to recognize different parts of your breakfast table as parts of a drum kit–tap one part and you get a snare drum, tap another and you hear the high hat, tap yet another and it’s a cymbal crash. And you’re ready to rock. It’s even possible, at least theoretically, to program the system to recognize spots in the air. So you could wave your hands around and create a symphony of sound.

At least that’s the idea. Now, this intrigues me for a few reasons. First, because I’m always interested in new technological gizmos. And second because I’m a musician. Which makes me wonder — what potential does this technology have as a musical instrument? Part of me–the curmudgeonly part–wants to believe that there’s really no substitute for learning and playing an actual instrument. Strumming the air to create acoustic guitar-like sounds on the computer isn’t the same, or not as good, as playing a real guitar. (Check out these dorks playing guitar hero, which is even worse.)

But another part of me wonders if there’s really any different. If there’s a computer system that can translate the movement of my hands and fingers into pristine guitar sounds … well, that’s pretty cool. At least it’s a really interesting toy, if nothing else.

The implications of this technology go beyond making music, of course. Theoretically, it would be possible to turn any space into a computer interface by programming the system to recognize a spot on the wall as a light switch or a spot on the coffee table as a TV remote control.

Is this the future of interactive computing? I guess we’ll soon find out.

And the Ignobel Winners are …

Published October 6th, 2008 in Uncategorized. 0 Comments

Everyone knows about the Nobel Prizes annually awarded for extraordinary achievements in physics, medicine, chemistry, economics, literature and peace. (Congratulations to this year’s winners in medicine–Francoise Barre-Sinoussi, Luc Montagnier and Harald zur Hausen for their discovery of the AIDS virus.)

But have you heard of the Ig Nobel Prizes? Sponsored by the magazine “Annals of Improbable Research” and MIT, the awards are given for research “that first make people laugh, and then make them think.”

(The Ig Nobels are awarded every year in early October, around the time that the Nobel Prizes are handed out. Check out a video of the 2006 ceremony here.)

The 2008 winners were just announced. Here’s a list copied directly from Wikipedia:

* Archaeology: Astolfo Gomes de Mello Araujo and Jose Carlos Marcelino, for showing that armadillos can mix up the contents of an archaeological site.[28][29]

* Biology: Marie-Christine Cadiergues, Christel Joubert, and Michel Franc, for discovering that fleas that live on dogs jump higher than fleas that live on cats.[30]

* Chemistry: Sheree Umpierre, Joseph Hill, and Deborah Anderson, for discovering that Coca-Cola is an effective spermicide,[31] and C.Y. Hong, C.C. Shieh, P. Wu, and B.N. Chiang for proving it is not.[32][33]

* Cognitive science: Toshiyuki Nakagaki, Hiroyasu Yamada, Ryo Kobayashi, Atsushi Tero, Akio Ishiguro, and Ágota Tóth, for discovering that slime molds can solve puzzles.[34][35]

* Economics: Geoffrey Miller, Joshua Tyber, and Brent Jordan, for discovering that exotic dancers earn more when at peak fertility.[36]

* Literature: David Sims, for his study “You Bastard: A Narrative Exploration of the Experience of Indignation within Organizations”.[37][38]

* Medicine: Dan Ariely for demonstrating that expensive placebos are more effective than inexpensive placebos.[39][40]

* Nutrition: Massimiliano Zampini and Charles Spence, for demonstrating that food tastes better when it sounds more appealing.[41][42]

* Peace: The Swiss Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology and the citizens of Switzerland, for adopting the legal principle that plants have dignity.[43]

* Physics: Dorian Raymer and Douglas Smith, for proving that heaps of string or hair will inevitably tangle.[44]

(For a list including links to the researchers’ prize-winning paper, go here.)

I just think it’s very cool that the scientific community is willing to poke fun at itself once in a while. Science is important, and it’s often presented in a very serious, sober manner. But science is also fun and weird and sometimes hilarious. The Ig Nobel awards are a great way to show people another side of the science community.

World Record Science

Published September 29th, 2008 in Bizarre and Uncategorized. 1 Comment

The other day my kids (7-year-old twin boys) came home from school all excited. The wanted to go to the bookstore right away and get the latest edition of the “Guinness World Records” (formerly titled “The Guinness Book of World Records”). I wasn’t sure this was a good idea. I hadn’t taken a look at the Guinness Book for years, but I remembered pouring over it when I was a kid and getting freaked out by the guy with super-long fingernails and all the other bizarre stuff in the book. After all, this book is the “literary” equivalent of a 19th century freak show featuring the world’s tallest man, the bearded lady, the person with the longest tongue and so on. What’s the point, really, of reading a book full of strange trivia compiled by a beer company?

But we got the 2009 edition anyway. And I must admit that the Guinness Book has come a long way. Sure, it’s still consists mainly of semi-interesting but mainly useless trivia. (Did you know that the record for longest wheelie on a skateboard is currently held by Stefan Akesson of Sweden, who traveled 224 feet, 10 inches on the back wheels of his board in a shopping mall. Do you care?) But there’s also a good deal of science in there. For example, the “Being Human” section is prefaced by an anatomical rendering of the human body annotated with interesting information about various bones and muscles. I learned, for example, that the body’s most active muscles are those surrounding the eye, which move around 100,000 times every day. That’s interesting. There’s also lots of valid science information in the “Living Planet” and “Space” sections.

I’m not saying that the “Guinness Book of Records” is a great educational resource for science or anything else. But it is possible to learn something about science while slogging through the rest of the stuff.

Water Bears in Space

Published September 22nd, 2008 in Animals and Bizarre. 5 Comments

On my daily slog through science websites I’ve come across several articles about microscopic animals called water bears, technically known as tardigrades. They’ve been in the news a lot lately because a recent experiment in space has shown that water bears are among the few living things that can survive direct exposure to the vacuum of space and to the sun’s ultraviolet radiation. Check out this article to learn more about the experiment.

Anyhow, this made me curious about water bears, and so I did a little research. Here’s what I learned:

–First, water bears are cute. Up close (as in through a microscope), the creatures do sort of resemble tiny bears. They have four legs and two arm-like appendages with what look like little claws. And when they move, water bears lumber around a bit like grizzly bears. (You can watch a movie of water bears in action here. (Apparently, according to this website, water bears were first named as such in 1773 by John August Ephraim Goeze, a German pastor.)

–There are at least 700 species of water bear, most of which are about half a millimeter long.

–The coolest thing about the water bear is that it’s able to survive extreme conditions by going into a state of suspended animation. Essentially, water bears can dry up and survive for years without water and be carried around on the wind. When they do come into contact with water, water bears revive and get on with their lives as though nothing happened.

The discovery that water bears can survive in space has been taken by some scientists as evidence that life arrived on Earth from space. This article, in the Sri Lanka “Daily News,” paraphrases one Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe to the effect that insects may have originated in space and been brought to earth by comets.

Whether or not that’s the case, water bears are an intriguing example of just how resilient life can be.

« Previous Entries

About

U. S. science writer Jeremy Shere writes frequently about weird and bizarre science for the Earth & Sky radio series. Jeremy also writes and produces for several other radio programs and writes for a variety of magazines.

Latest Posts

RSS

EarthSky Channels

My Topics

Meta