GoodFuels

Bug Genes Hold Cellulosic Ethanol Promise

The ability of some creepy, pesky insects to digest leaves and wood may hold a key to advancing the production of cellulosic ethanol from biomass.

Researchers at the University of Florida have been studying termite guts to figure out what genetic sequencing allows those insects to churn wood into fuel. That ability involves a mixture of enzymes from symbiotic bacteria and other single-celled organisms living in termites’ guts, as well as enzymes from the termites themselves, which could ultimately improve the production of cellulosic ethanol. Once the genetic sequence that produces the enzymes can be isolated, it could be transferred into genetically modified fungi or bacteria, or possibly into other insects, such as caterpillars, to produce the enzymes on an industrial scale.

Meanwhile, scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the and Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC) have been doing similar work with leaf cutter ants. In this case, they are looking at the spongy fungus gardens that the insects grow themselves. Some of these ant communities have a picky appetite and only eat certain types of plant leaves; others are omnivores and digest the cellulose in a wide variety of leaves. GLBRC is studying the fungi and bacteria from these communities to identify microbial enzymes that can help generate fuels from the cellulose, or non-edible, part of the leaf.

“Insects have played an important role in how this planet functions for millions of years,” says University of Flrodia entomologist Mike Scharf. “There are still many ways we can learn to benefit from Earth’s six-legged inhabitants.”

Whatever works.