Bacteria could detect leaks at carbon capture sites
Monday, October 3, 2016 - 12:31
in Earth & Climate
Bacteria and archaea could be used to monitor stored carbon dioxide (CO2) and convert it into useful products, such as ethanol and acetate, say researchers at the Scottish Association for Marine Science (SAMS) and the University of Oslo. In an Opinion published October 3, in Trends in Biotechnology, they discuss how new bioinformatics tools would enable researchers to read shifts in microbial community genetics—making it possible to, for example, detect potential CO2 leaks—and how such analyses could contribute to making large-scale capture and storage of CO2 feasible.