Hydrogen production in extreme bacterium

[shawn001]

Very interesting.


Hydrogen production in extreme bacterium

Scientists have discovered a bacterium that can produce hydrogen, an element that one day could lessen the world’s dependence on oil.

Hydrogen production in extreme bacterium -- ScienceDaily

 

[Kirran]

Very interesting.


Hydrogen production in extreme bacterium

Scientists have discovered a bacterium that can produce hydrogen, an element that one day could lessen the world’s dependence on oil.

Hydrogen production in extreme bacterium -- ScienceDaily

Man, that's an interesting find. I feel like we can transfer some genes into E. coli.

 

[Brickjectivity]

Man, that's an interesting find. I feel like we can transfer some genes into E. coli.

Now that would be something wouldn't it, although part of the problem with producing hydrogen is that you mustn't let it interact with an alkaline environment too much since acid=water with hydrogen in it. Mix base and acid together, and they rapidly cancel to form water. Apparently the high alkalinity and salt environment is what enables these bacteria to produce hydrogen, and so the trick is removing the produced hydrogen from solution before it can react with the alkaline (base with PH greater than 7) environment. An alkaline environment contains excess OH- ions which should instantly react to H+ ions to form plain old water. I suppose they are trying to use semi-permeable membranes to syphon off the Hydrogent and all kinds of unnatural tricks. As a non chemist with absolutely no idea what he's talking about its what I'd do -- something unnatural. I'd have a membrane with openings so small that only hydrogen (not water) could get through, and I've have a complete vacuum on one side to encourage the hydrogen to come through. Or I'd make the germs live in a non-aqueous environment somehow. Perhaps I would use some of that material that was used in the famous 'Cold Fusion' experiment.

 

[Kirran]

Now that would be something wouldn't it, although part of the problem with producing hydrogen is that you mustn't let it interact with an aqueous environment too much since acid=water with hydrogen in it. Apparently the high alkalinity and salt environment is what enables these bacteria to produce hydrogen, and so the trick is removing the produced hydrogen from the aqueous environment before it can react with the alkaline environment. An alkaline environment contains excess OH- ions should instantly react to H+ ions to form plain old water. I suppose they are trying to use semi-permeable membranes to do that and all kinds of unnatural tricks. As a non chemist with absolutely no idea what he's talking about its what I'd do -- something unnatural. I'd have a membrane with openings so small that only hydrogen (not water) could get through, and I've have a complete vacuum on one side to encourage the hydrogen to come through. Or I'd make the germs live in a non-aqueous environment somehow. Perhaps I would use some of that material that was used in the famous 'Cold Fusion' experiment.

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

The separation seems like it would be the main difficulty here, as you say.

I'm going to put this to a lecturer of mine tomorrow, to see what general thoughts he has. Unless the queue to ask him questions is too big, I don't want to hold anybody up.

 

[Kirran]

Thinking a bit more about this - can we immobilise bacteria expressing the genes required for this production of hydrogen on some surface, and then basically have them periodically removed from water so they can produce hydrogen, which we can harvest, before being returned to alkaline water as necessary for their survival?

Or, actually, can we just use bacteria which don't require immersion in water for survival as an expression system? Yeah, that's better than my first idea.

 

[Brickjectivity]

All this brainstorming is giving me a messiah complex! I'm going to write a letter to those researchers, because they might need my help!

Thinking a bit more about this - can we immobilise bacteria expressing the genes required for this production of hydrogen on some surface, and then basically have them periodically removed from water so they can produce hydrogen, which we can harvest, before being returned to alkaline water as necessary for their survival?

Or, actually, can we just use bacteria which don't require immersion in water for survival as an expression system? Yeah, that's better than my first idea.

That is a good idea and sounds practical.

How about hydrogen producing bacteria that live in a hydrophilic conductive paste, and we use that as the medium for a low current electrolytic process? That means we use the bacteria for the energy-intensive separation of the hydrogen and OH- ions (using light energy and corn or whatever they will eat), and then we use a tiny amount of electricity to separate the H+ ions from the mixture. We tweak the process to produce both Hydrogen and alcohols. Its like a distillery but better. Now that's some true pie in the sky.

 

[Kirran]

All this brainstorming is giving me a messiah complex! I'm going to write a letter to those researchers, because they might need my help!

How have they lasted this long without you?

That is a good idea and sounds practical.

How about hydrogen producing bacteria that live in a hydrophilic conductive paste, and we use that as the medium for a low current electrolytic process? That means we use the bacteria for the energy-intensive separation of the hydrogen and OH- ions (using light energy and corn or whatever they will eat), and then we use a tiny amount of electricity to separate the H+ ions from the mixture. We tweak the process to produce both Hydrogen and alcohols. Its like a distillery but better. Now that's some true pie in the sky.

Yeah, that sounds feasible to me, although the electrolytic separation of the H+ ions isn't something I would have thought of straight away. But yeah, that's a very necessary step.

We could use Saccharomyces cerevisiae and have alcohol as well easy.

 

[Brickjectivity]

Yeah, that sounds feasible to me, although the electrolytic separation of the H+ ions isn't something I would have thought of straight away. But yeah, that's a very necessary step.

We could use Saccharomyces cerevisiae and have alcohol as well easy.

Oh, yes. Saccharomyces cerevisiae is what I was about to say! I was just about to google search it.

 

[Kirran]

Oh, yes. Saccharomyces cerevisiae is what I was about to say! I was just about to google search it.

Good solid model organism right there. And far more convenient for our purposes than using mice.