Photo: wikimedia
There’s no secret anymore that living organisms create gases. There’s CO2 in your breath for example, but if that seems useless, your flatulence might contain methane and hydrogen, all created by the bacteria in your bowels that decompose food.
Still, putting people harvest their own farts might seem absurd. But that’s why scientist are working to determine bacteria continuously create useful gases on their own. The latest news come from the University of Turku, Finland, where a team of scientists led by Pauli Kallio managed to modify the E.Coli bacteria to generate propane.
The team chose the E.Coli bacteria due to its commonness and inserted a synthetic pathway into its cell to convert fat acids into propane, a gas that is highly used and found in limited quantities.
Further researching needs to be done though, with the science team wanting to apply more modifications to the bacteria, hoping to implement photosynthesis in the process and create propane using sun light.
There are over 13 million vehicles worldwide using propane, being the third most popular fuel after gasoline and diesel. In some countries it's known as Autogas and due to its storage at moderate pressure and burning process type, propane comes with several advantages than using the conventional fuels.
For example, refill times are shorter and the fuel tanks are cheaper to construct. The propane itself is cheaper and it is also cleaner to use, resulting in less engine wear (due to carbon deposits).
Propane is also used for blowtorches, hot air balloons, special effects in the movie industry, propellant for Paintball and Airsoft guns as well as spray cans.
The team chose the E.Coli bacteria due to its commonness and inserted a synthetic pathway into its cell to convert fat acids into propane, a gas that is highly used and found in limited quantities.
Further researching needs to be done though, with the science team wanting to apply more modifications to the bacteria, hoping to implement photosynthesis in the process and create propane using sun light.
There are over 13 million vehicles worldwide using propane, being the third most popular fuel after gasoline and diesel. In some countries it's known as Autogas and due to its storage at moderate pressure and burning process type, propane comes with several advantages than using the conventional fuels.
For example, refill times are shorter and the fuel tanks are cheaper to construct. The propane itself is cheaper and it is also cleaner to use, resulting in less engine wear (due to carbon deposits).
Propane is also used for blowtorches, hot air balloons, special effects in the movie industry, propellant for Paintball and Airsoft guns as well as spray cans.
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