Black Fungus Found in Chernobyl Eats Harmful Radiation

Arturo Casadevall et al., PLoS ONE

The fungus Cladosporium sphaerospermum can harness dangerous radiation to grow.

Fungi could eat dangerous radiation to survive, an unexpected finding that could one day help feed astronauts in space — at least those willing to eat a crawling fungus.

The research began with the discovery of black fungus growing on the walls of the damaged, highly radioactive Chernobyl nuclear reactor and collected by robots.

The fungus was rich with melanin, the same pigment that gives human skin its color, protecting the skin from solar and ultraviolet radiation. Melanin is found in many, if not most, fungal species.

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"The fungal kingdom comprises more species than any other plant or animal kingdom," said researcher Arturo Casadevall, an immunologist at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York.

Nuclear and other high-energy reactions give off ionizing radiation — dangerous rays and particles that can damage genes and thus cause mutations, and eventually cancer.

"Just as the pigment chlorophyll converts sunlight into chemical energy that allows green plants to live and grow," so might melanin help fungi make use of ionizing radiation, said nuclear medicine specialist Ekaterina Dadachova at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

The scientists experimented on three species of fungi. They consistently found that ionizing radiation significantly boosted the growth of fungi that contained melanin.

"In general we think of radiation as something bad or harmful. Here we have a situation where these fungi appear to benefit, which is unexpected," Casadevall told LiveScience.

For example, the researchers exposed two kinds of fungi — one that naturally contained melanin (Wangiella dermatitidis) and another that scientists induced to make the pigment (Crytococcus neoformans) — to levels of ionizing radiation about 500 times higher than normal, the doses one might see at high altitudes where atmospheric shielding from cosmic rays is lessened.

Both species grew significantly faster, as detailed in the May 23 issue of the journal PLoS ONE.

The researchers stressed these findings do not mean fungi can eat radioactive matter and somehow cleanse it. Rather, the fungi can simply harness the energy that radioactive materials give off.

The ability of fungi to live off ionizing radiation could prove useful to people.

"Since ionizing radiation is prevalent in outer space, astronauts might be able to rely on fungi as an inexhaustible food source on long missions or for colonizing other planets," Dadachova said.

Casadevall also noted that the melanin in fungi is no different chemically from the melanin in human skin.

"It's pure speculation — but not outside the realm of possibility — that melanin could be providing energy to skin cells," he said. "While it wouldn't be enough energy to fuel a run on the beach, maybe it could help you to open an eyelid."

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New Material Could Drop Cost of Carbon Capture

Georgia Tech scientists have developed a new material that, combined with the right process, could become the cheapest way to separate the greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide, out of coal plants' smokestacks.

"It's pretty easy and cheap to make and it's got a high capacity for CO2 under realistic conditions," said Chris Jones, a chemical engineer at Georgia Tech.

Those conditions require a material that can trap CO2 out of a mixture of water vapor, nitrogen, and oxygen (among other things), and then release that carbon dioxide on-demand. Being able to do that cheaply remains a dream, and one that some say will always remain "vaporware."

But scientists are pushing on with the effort to develop the right systems to make coal plants outfitted with carbon capture and sequestration cost-competitive with other future power solutions like solar concentrating plants.

Jones' research appears online in the Journal of the American Chemical Society. (Update: Link Fixed. Thanks JMB.)

Two types of materials are seen to have special potential for carbon dioxide separation--zeolites, like Omar Yaghi's ZIFs, and amines. Jones' material is the new top-dog in the latter category because it captures CO2 better than other types of amines and can be used more times (like a longer-lasting sponge). And under real conditions, Jones believes his material could outperform zeolites.

The key challenge is that the material heats up as it traps CO2, then requires heat to release it. In order to be cost effective, he said the heat must be captured and then reused.

"Engineering a process that allows you to capture that heat is the key issue in making this process as cheap as possible," he said. To create a process, he's enlisted fellow Georgia Tech researcher, Bill Koros, to design a new type of so-called filtering bed, which they hope will solve the heat transfer problem.

As we've noted in the past, well-meaning people disagree on whether supporting any sort of coal burning makes sense, but there are two reasons to support carbon capture and sequestration, or the separation and geological burying of carbon dioxide:

• One, with China building two plants a week and a 1000 coal plants already online here in the US, we need a solution that can be "bolted-on" to existing plants, which aren't going to disappear the minute that RE <>. As Jones put it, "If you want to make an impact, you want to be able to develop something that can target the old dirty coal plants."

Two, biomass burning + sequestration could be a way to actually pull historical CO2 out of the atmosphere. I do, now, have new reservations about biomass, though. Ausra CEO, Bob Fishman, almost had me convinced that biomass was a bad idea. He maintains that you have to grow all the feedstock for the plant ultralocally (like within 50 miles of the plant) to keep the plant environmentally net positive. (And I'm ducking the general biofuel debate that is now raging.)

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Branson's coconut airways - but jet is on a flight to nowhere, say critics

Environmental groups raise doubts over plane that runs partly on biofuel

Virgin Atlantic's 747 at Heathrow airport ready to take off to Amsterdam for the first biofuel flight by an airline. Photograph: Steve Parsons/PA

A little after 11.30 yesterday morning, a Boeing 747 running on jet fuel and the oil from 150,000 coconuts parted company with the runway at Heathrow and slipped into a hazy blue sky.

Forty minutes later, the first commercial aircraft to be powered partly by biofuel touched down at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam, paving the way for what some claim could be a revolution in environmentally responsible aviation.

The experiment was the brainchild of the Virgin Atlantic boss, Sir Richard Branson, who hailed the flight as a "historic occasion" and the first step towards using biofuels on commercial flights. Three of the 747's four tanks were filled with normal jet fuel while its fourth carried a mixture that was 80% jet fuel and 20% coconut and babassu palm oil.

"Today marks a biofuel breakthrough for the whole airline industry," Branson told a press conference held next to the aircraft in a Heathrow hangar. "Virgin Atlantic, and its partners, are proving that you can find an alternative to traditional jet fuel and fly a plane on new technology, such as sustainable biofuel."

Branson has pledged to invest profits from his transport empire in biofuel production, but serious doubts have already been raised. Critics argue that biofuels damage developing countries by driving up food prices and harm the environment by encouraging deforestation.

The Heathrow trial, in partnership with Boeing, engine maker General Electric, and Imperium Renewables, attempted to assuage those concerns by using biofuel made from coconut oil harvested from existing plantations in the Philippines and oil from babassu palms, which grow wild in Brazil.

However, Branson admitted that the biofuel mix that partially powered yesterday's flight would not be used commercially.

Wild ideas

Land given to coconut plantations would have to be vastly expanded to satisfy the demands of aviation, resulting in deforestation, while the babassu palms used in yesterday's experiment are not available in sufficient numbers.

The airline industry, he added, would probably have to turn to algae in its search for viable biofuels. Algae are grown in ponds rather than on land, so they do not require deforestation or take space that could be used for food crops.

Branson said: "This pioneering flight will enable those of us who are serious about reducing our carbon emissions to go on developing the fuels of the future, fuels which will power our aircraft in the years ahead through sustainable next-generation oils, such as algae."

Environmental groups have warned that processing algae may produce more carbon dioxide than is saved by using it as an alternative fuel. There are also concerns that algae will compete for fresh-water sources as the ponds evaporate and have to be topped up.

Tim Jones, a policy officer at the World Development Movement, said the minimal amount of biofuel used in the trial underlined the difficulty of reducing emissions within the aviation industry. "It only reduces carbon dioxide emissions by 20% and there is no technology available that allows us to fly without making emissions."

Kenneth Richter, Friends of the Earth aviation campaigner, said: "Biofuels are a major distraction in the fight against climate change. There is mounting evidence that the carbon savings from biofuels are negligible. If Virgin was really serious about reducing the aviation industry's impact on the environment it would support calls for aircraft emissions to be included in the climate change bill."

Aircraft account for 5.5% of UK carbon dioxide emissions and Virgin Atlantic is not the first aviation group to experiment with alternative fuels. Earlier this month, the jet manufacturer Airbus flew an A380 superjumbo with a mix of gas-to-liquid fuel.

A much-trumpeted biofuels trial at Virgin Trains was abandoned last year after the group lost its CrossCountry franchise. A Virgin Trains spokesman said the company was "considering" whether to launch a new trial on the West Coast route.

Concerns about biofuels have spread to mainstream transport companies including National Express, which abandoned a biofuel trial for its buses amid fears that it was causing more harm than good to the environment.

The government acknowledged those concerns last week when it ordered a review of the environmental and economic impact of biofuels.

The transport secretary, Ruth Kelly, said the government might not support an EU proposal to increase the proportion of biofuel in petrol and diesel to 10% by 2020 if the review raises serious doubts.

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