First there was ethanol. Then there was butanol. Now there's an alcohol biofuel poised to put both to shame. Using new tricks of the trade, scientists at UCLA have synthesized an alcohol molecule that has as many carbon atoms as a molecule of gasoline. It releases as much energy per gallon and can be dropped right into the tank.
(Photograph by Scott Heiner/S. Lowry/Univ. Ulster/Getty Images)
As bacterium goes, E. coli is a public health scourge, but a lab favorite. It's one of the most thoroughly studied microbes out there, and so one of the most easily manipulated for genetic engineering. Scientists can tweak its metabolic pathways to produce insulin
, antibiotics and anticancer drugs; they can increase its ability to make ethanol or even engineer it to manufacture hydrocarbons. But until now, they couldn't push it to create something that didn't exist naturally: long-chain alcohols.
By manipulating E. coli to produce alcohols with up to eight carbon atoms, James Liao and his colleagues at the University of California-Los Angeles recently introduced a new twist to the field of biofuels research. Long-chain alcohols overcome some of the traditional limitations of ethanol, which has only two carbon atoms. They have both high-energy density—on par with gasoline—and low water solubility, so they are compatible with existing infrastructure.
"Long-chain alcohols can be directly used in automobiles or aircraft," Liao says. "Unlike E85, which requires retrofitted vehicles, [they] can be used without vehicle modification."
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