Peer Reviewed Sources for Can Alternative Energy Effectively Replace Fossil Fuels?
A Purdue University scientist is studying the role of plants in renewable free energy sources. Maureen McCann, a professor of biological sciences, is studying a wide range of plants from poplar copse to zinnias. Her lab has characterized hundreds of plant genes and their products in an effort to sympathise how they all collaborate and how they could exist manipulated in advantageous ways. (Purdue University photo/Rebecca McElhoe) Download image
Scientist turns to zinnias, roadside weeds, other plants to create efficient biofuels
WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. — As global temperatures and free energy demand ascent simultaneously, the search for sustainable fuel sources is more urgent than e'er. But how can renewable energy possibly scale up to replace the vast quantities of oil and gas we consume?
Plant ability is a pregnant piece of the answer, says Purdue scientist Maureen McCann.
"Plants are the basis of the future bioeconomy," she says. "In my mind, building a sustainable economy means nosotros stop earthworks carbon out of footing and begin to make apply of one and a half billion tons of biomass available in the U.Due south. on an annual basis. That's the strategic carbon reserve that we demand to exploit in society to displace oil."
McCann is a professor of biological sciences, former director of the Free energy Center at Purdue'due south Discovery Park, and president-elect of the American Society of Constitute Biologists. She has spent her academic career looking at constitute cell walls, which comprise some of the most complicated molecules in nature. By studying a wide range of plants — from poplar trees to zinnias — her lab has characterized hundreds of institute genes and their products in an try to understand how they all interact and how they could be manipulated in advantageous ways.
The ethanol industry uses enzymes to pause starchy corn kernels down into glucose molecules, which, in turn, are fermented by microorganisms to produce usable fuel. Many researchers take been working on the possibility of getting more glucose by breaking downwardly cellulose — the primary fibrous component of all plant cell walls — which is much more abundant than starch. However, McCann says their methods might be ignoring a valuable resource.
In improver to cellulose, cell walls contain many circuitous, poly-effluvious molecules chosen lignins. These compounds tin can get in the way of enzymes and catalysts that are trying to access cellulose and pause it down into useful glucose. As a consequence, many labs have previously attempted to create plants that have more cellulose and fewer lignins in their cell walls.
Just it turns out lignins are important for constitute development and can be a valuable source of chemicals. As director of Purdue'southward Center for Directly Catalytic Conversion of Biomass to Biofuels (C3Bio), McCann collaborated with chemists and chemical engineers in maximizing utilization of bachelor biomass, including lignins. A nine-yr grant from the U.S. Section of Energy funded C3Bio researchers' piece of work toward using chemic catalysts to transform both cellulose and lignins into liquid hydrocarbons, which are more energy-dumbo than ethanol and fully compatible with engines and existing fuel infrastructure.
In light of lignins' usefulness, McCann and her colleagues are interested in alternative biofuel optimization strategies that don't involve reducing plants' lignin content. For example, if the researchers can attune the strength of the "mucilage" between plant cells, they tin arrive easier for enzymes to access cellulose and also reduce the amount of energy needed for shredding the plant cloth. Another approach involves genetically technology living, growing plants to incorporate chemical catalysts into their own cell walls, which will assistance eventual breakdown exist faster and more complete.
"In both cases, this piece of work is a reflection of synthetic biology thinking," McCann says. "Nosotros don't simply take what nature gives u.s.a.; we think of means to improve the performance of the biomass using the entirety of the genetics toolkit."
McCann encourages others to think nearly "pathways of carbon."
"If we retrieve of how plants abound, they're marvelous chemists. They're taking in carbon dioxide from the temper and h2o through their roots, and converting those simple molecules into highly complex jail cell wall structures," she says. "When we think nigh making use of institute material in a biorefinery, a key goal is to make sure that every carbon atom that the plants so carefully trapped every bit part of their bodies ends up in a useful target molecule — whether that's a liquid hydrocarbon or a component of some material with advanced backdrop."
As synthetic biologists, McCann and her lab members remember holistically about optimizing crops for producing food, biofuel and useful materials such as specialized chemicals. Regardless of end purpose, she says, she keeps 3 dimensions in mind when thinking about optimization: increasing yield per acre, increasing the quality and value of each found and increasing the surface area of land on which crops tin can exist grown profitably. The holistic approach is particularly important for ensuring that scientists and agricultural producers attain these goals without compromising the global environs or local ecosystems.
"As a new bioeconomy emerges powered by the life sciences, plants are at the root of it in so many means — both in terms of the free energy they can provide and also the kinds of molecules that they can produce," McCann says.
For now, she acknowledges that ending economic dependence on fossil fuels is a work in progress. The transition to a renewable energy economy will require multiple levels of alter over time. For instance, even if we made the switch entirely to electrical cars, we would likely yet need hydrocarbon fuels to mine lithium for the batteries and to run machines with longer lifetimes than cars, such as airplanes and ocean-going vessels. Notwithstanding she maintains a positive outlook.
"Something that gives me great optimism is that we're going through a revolution in our power to make new discoveries that lead to technologies that enable acceleration of the footstep of discovery," she says. "We're going to discover new ways of converting energy from one form to another that we haven't even imagined. The capacity to brand this substantial change from a fossil-based to a renewables-based economy is going to be there. We just demand to drive information technology forward."
McCann is in the Section of Biological Sciences, which is housed in the College of Science.
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Writer: Grace Niewijk
Media contact: Amy Patterson Neubert, 765-412-0864, apatterson@purdue.edu
Source: Maureen McCann, mmccann@purdue.edu
Notation to Journalists : A photo of Maureen McCann is available for journalists to utilise via a Google Bulldoze folder.
Source: https://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/releases/2020/Q2/can-renewable-energy-really-replace-fossil-fuels.html
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