Unprecedented worldwide biodiversity study

Humans depend on high levels of ecosystem biodiversity, but due to climate change and changes in land use, biodiversity loss is now greater than at any time in human history. Five University of Alberta researchers, including ...

Microbe produces ethanol from switchgrass without pretreatment

The conventional strategy for producing ethanol from plant biomass requires costly pretreatment and enzyme-driven reactions. Refining another strategy known as consolidated bioprocessing (CPB) could reduce costs. In second-generation ...

MaxBin: Automated sorting through metagenomes

Microbes – the single-celled organisms that dominate every ecosystem on Earth - have an amazing ability to feed on plant biomass and convert it into other chemical products. Tapping into this talent has the potential to ...

Termites evolved complex bioreactors 30 million years ago

Achieving complete breakdown of plant biomass for energy conversion in industrialized bioreactors remains a complex challenge, but new research shows that termite fungus farmers solved this problem more than 30 million years ...

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