09/02/2011
Lauren Sibert |
Several Tulane scientists have discovered a microbe, TU-103, that can convert newspapers into fuel for cars.David Mullin, associate professor in the Cell and Molecular Biology department, worked with postdoctoral fellow Harshad Velankar and undergraduate student Hailee Rask to discover a microbe that uses plant material to make butanol, a potential replacement for gasoline.
The product of two years' effort, TU-103 can make butanol out of old newspapers and any type of plant or plant product. Because plants are made up of cellulose and TU-103 uses cellulose to make butanol, TU-103 can turn any plant into butanol. Mullin said his team is now using different types of plant matter like bagass, a sugarcane waste product, to make butanol.
"Cellulose is present everywhere: paper, grass, leaves, corn cobs, corn stalks and renewable agricultural waste products," Mullin said. "It is available on a vast scale since things like corn stalks and corn cobs are usually thrown away."
By using products that would normally be discarded, this process taps into a renewable, sustainable source of fuel that leaves a significantly smaller carbon footprint. Butanol is a fuel that has approximately the same energy content as gasoline but produces no smog or no harmful emissions.
pretty closely matches with the CO2 that is being used by plants to make more cellulose," Mullin said. "So it is sort of a zero sum game. You're not pumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere like you might if you were using gasoline."
Jeffrey Sigler, professor of practice in the earth and environmental sciences department, said biofuels generally burn cleaner. In the case of ethanol, however, the amount of land needed to grow the corn and the CO2 used to plant and harvest the corn significantly decreases its value as a clean-burning fuel. If the waste from already-grown corn can be used, it can greatly reduce the impact on the land and air quality.
"Biofuels in general are better for air quality than gasoline," Sigler said. "They burn cleaner. If agricultural waste products are being used as the feedstock in this case, it seems to me that this could be an important step toward reducing net CO2 emissions from these types of fuels, as well as minimizing land use impacts."
Butanol requires no changes to automobile to use. Mullin cited an experiment in which a group of scientists drove a 1981 Buick Skylark with no modifications from San Francisco to St. Louis using butanol. They found that they got almost the same gas mileage as with unleaded gasoline and released significantly fewer emissions than with gasoline.
Since butanol requires no changes to use in an automobile, Mullin said he sees an opportunity for Tulane to considerably reduce its carbon footprint. He hopes to eventually see the golf carts and various university automobiles running on butanol.
The TU-103 discovery has garnered the attention of media nationwide. Mullin has been interviewed on FOX News, MSNBC, a nationally syndicated radio program and has been featured in articles on dozens of websites. He hopes that TU-103 will provide Tulane students with opportunities to work at established laboratories, as large companies start to take notice of TU-103.
"I would really like to see students be able to travel to a company, work on a larger scale and be able to get experience on a larger scale," Mullin said. "It is one thing to research on a small scale, but it is another to go to a place where they're actually producing this on a large scale. I think that would be a great thing for this university."
Hailee Rask, a junior cell and molecular biology major, said she learned a lot from the hands-on involvement. Her job was to conduct the experiments and to do the analyses afterward. Rask said she plans to continue researching with Mullin and urges other students to get involved in projects on campus.
"It has been a lot of work, but it has been a really good experience," Rask said, "I'm really glad that I was able to get involved in it."
The future of TU-103 depends on the amount of funding that Mullin and his research team receive. Right now, their operation is small scale. Mullin, however, hopes that an industrial partner with a special interest in his project will allow them to discover in greater depth the possibilities TU-103 holds.
"I really would like to see this process developed into something at a larger scale that people could utilize," Mullin said. "I'm not really equipped to do that here, but if there was an industrial partner that had the capability to produce butanol on a large scale, it would give me some pleasure knowing that our research efforts in some way contributed to reducing the energy dependency of the United States on foreign oil."
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