[HN Gopher] Scientists complete starch synthesis from CO2, revol...
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Scientists complete starch synthesis from CO2, revolutionary for
agricultural
Author : hourislate
Score : 88 points
Date : 2021-09-26 15:58 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.globaltimes.cn)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.globaltimes.cn)
| citboin wrote:
| Here's the paper :
|
| https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abh4049?url_ver=...
| jarenmf wrote:
| From the paper in question[1]
|
| "carbon dioxide is reduced to methanol by an inorganic catalyst
| and then converted by enzymes first to three and six carbon sugar
| units and then to polymeric starch. This artificial starch
| anabolic pathway relies on engineered recombinant enzymes from
| many different source organisms and can be tuned to produce
| amylose or amylopectin at excellent rates and efficiencies
| relative to other synthetic carbon fixation systems--and,
| depending on the metric"
|
| https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abh4049
| entee wrote:
| The catalyst is the part I'm most curious about. Carbon capture
| is a hard problem at scale. Once you have methanol, I'm not
| terribly surprised that you can convert it to other things
| enzymatically. Hard to evaluate without full text of paper
| though.
| pacman2 wrote:
| Good idea for the wrong product. Does not make sense to make
| food out of it, at least not on earth.
|
| "carbon dioxide is reduced to methanol by an inorganic
| catalyst"
|
| The methanol can be used as fuel.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanol_economy
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| Another almost content free press release.
|
| I wish that there could be some standard that press releases
| would adhere to that would require them to link to authoritative
| documents and to include statements of energy efficiency, etc.
| pphysch wrote:
| The referenced paper:
| https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abh4049
| wcoenen wrote:
| Also covered on phys.org: https://phys.org/news/2021-09-chinese-
| scientists-starch-synt...
| jpollock wrote:
| Can't you go from starches to plastics? So, wouldn't this allow
| fossil fuel free plastic, without having to convert land from
| food to plastic production?
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bioplastic
| gpcr1949 wrote:
| the very first intermediate is methanol (produced chemically in
| one step via hydrogenation in this paper, using a known method)
| so you can just use methanol to polymers via method of choice,
| e.g. [0] no need to convert to starch first.
|
| [0] https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acscatal.5b00007
| mrfusion wrote:
| Can anyone explain how this works?
| ChuckMcM wrote:
| See jarenmf's comment. Basically the CO2 is catalyzed into
| Methane using an 'inorganic catalyst', there is this paper[1]
| which uses a ruthenium catalyst at 400 degrees C to do it.
|
| Then the methane is consumed by some genetically modified
| bacteria (probably e.coli) first to convert it to an
| intermediate product, and then with a second organism to
| convert it into starch.
|
| In the article they talk about genetically modified enzymes and
| I've actually jumped ahead to the using genetically modified
| bacteria here[2]. I think that is a safe assumption as a number
| of bio-reactors do exactly this.
|
| What is somewhat interesting to me is that livestock generates
| a lot of methane, if you could harvest it and convert it back
| into starch to feed the livestock you could increase the
| efficiency of raising livestock farming.
|
| [1] https://phys.org/news/2020-02-method-carbon-dioxide-
| methane-...
|
| [2] The article hasn't appeared in sci-hub yet :-)
| gpcr1949 wrote:
| the CO2 is converted to methanol not methane. theoretically 3
| equivalents of dihydrogen (which you need energy to produce)
| are needed per CO2. the hydrogenation requires veery high
| concentrations of CO2 (energy needed to concentrate it) and
| H2 so from the energy point of view it is not that good.
| however from the point of view of bio-engineering it is a
| really nice result
| entee wrote:
| Most of the methane comes from cattle belching, so it's
| basically impossible to harvest at scale. The lagoons of
| manure also do, and that can be harvested though it's hard.
|
| https://climate.nasa.gov/faq/33/which-is-a-bigger-methane-
| so...
| entrep wrote:
| I came up with this solution:
| https://i.imgur.com/8BNktVY.png
| xchaotic wrote:
| I nominated you for IgNobel 2022
| mrfusion wrote:
| Thanks. Isn't it cheating to use bacteria? I thought this was
| all synthetic.
| xchaotic wrote:
| "CO2 is catalyzed into Methane using an 'inorganic catalyst',
| there is this paper[1] which uses a ruthenium catalyst at 400
| degrees C" that either alchemy or more energy consuming than
| agriculture. "Silver-gray ruthenium metal looks like platinum
| but is rarer," - great to keep the costs down and avoid wars
| in places like congo eh? ;)
| shauryamanu wrote:
| Even the news article didn't care to explain the process.
| [deleted]
| mrfusion wrote:
| Sounds like huge news for space exploration and colonization.
| First step in building a Star Trek replicator?
| ben_w wrote:
| Cool though the development in the article is, everything I
| hear about space colonisation says that to make it viable you
| need power and physical space on a scale that isn't
| significantly harmed by "just" using hydroponics and
| aeroponics, and the hardest problem in any case is the protein
| rather than the calories.
|
| (That and Trek replicators being much to fast for any mechanism
| we currently know about, so think "better bread machines" until
| someone can demonstrate 3D printing with IDK atomic quantum
| holography or something).
| baybal2 wrote:
| Protein from hydrocarbons was available since at least
| seventies. Google paprin, and gaprin. Paprin is yeast eating
| paraffin, gaprin is methane oxidising bacteria.
|
| I myself ate a porridge of paprin once when the food
| situation in Russia was bad enough.
| TomAbel wrote:
| Interesting is this what you are referring to
|
| >In the Soviet Union, the first production of feed protein
| from hydrocarbons took place in the 1970s. In total, the
| country built 12 plants with a designed production
| performance of around 1 million tonnes per year. This was
| close to 70% of the world's bioprotein production at that
| time. The importance of the bioprotein industry in the
| country was comparable with that of the nuclear industry,
| since it allowed the Soviet Union to be self-sufficient in
| feedstuffs.[1]
|
| According to the article[1] the paprin caused health issues
| for the animals fed on it and health problems for the
| people who ate the the meat obtained from the animals.
|
| >Paprin had a devastating impact on animal health. This
| product disturbed the hormonal and water balance, causing
| the formation of oedema all over the animals' bodies, the
| Russian Business Consulting agency reported, citing
| research by the Bashkiria State University. Meat obtained
| from these animals was causing flare-ups of chronic
| diseases in consumers. "Meat obtained from animals fed with
| Paprin contained an accumulation of abnormal amino acids
| that were incorporated into the membranes of nerve cells,
| thus disrupting the process of conducting a normal nerve
| impulse," said Raisa Bashirova, senior researcher at
| Bashkiria State University. She added that it was even
| dangerous for humans to work with Paprin: "The workers at
| the plants and local residents were developing diseases
| such as thrush and bronchial asthma."
|
| While the grapin was proved to be safe.
|
| [1]https://www.allaboutfeed.net/all-about/new-
| proteins/bioprote...
| shauryamanu wrote:
| Taking this news with a grain of salt, with obvious reasons.
| bshipp wrote:
| Every time I read the Global Times I find myself wondering "how
| does a propaganda paper for a country with 1.4 billion people
| still not know how to write things that don't sound like
| blantant propaganda?"
|
| You'd think, with all their resources, they could have hired
| someone a bit more learned in the gentle art of subtlety.
| iandanforth wrote:
| Because starchy foods are delicious with a bit of salt?
| _aleph2c_ wrote:
| If this is true, it spells the end of traditional farming
| practices and an end to starvation.
| swiley wrote:
| That depends on how much energy is required. It does mean that
| settlements in places like the Yukon and Northern Alaska are
| now much more interesting.
| ttul wrote:
| Pack the far north with SMRs, use the electricity to power
| CO2 capture farms and make starch, and the waste heat can
| heat homes. Northern Alberta never looked so good.
| breakyerself wrote:
| I think energy is going to get a lot cheaper in the coming
| years. Especially at times when renewables are overproducing.
| You-Are-Right wrote:
| Wnich indicators do you see for that? Any data, facts, or
| is this just guessing?
| rozab wrote:
| > Preliminary lab tests show that synthetic starch is about 8.5
| times more efficient than starch produced by conventional
| agriculture. Under the condition of sufficient energy supply and
| current technical parameters, the annual production of starch of
| 1 cubic meter bioreactor is equivalent to the annual production
| of starch of 5 mu (0.33 hectare) of corn in China.
|
| Ah of course, leaving aside the small issue of energy use this
| process does indeed seem very efficient
| phtrivier wrote:
| I suppose the upside could be that you _could_ imagine (if, of
| course, the whole thing was efficient enough) a process where
| you use low-carbon electricity (nuclear or poorly-timed
| renewables) to power CO2 capture from air, and then turn the
| CO2 into starch, and then maybe turn the starch into something
| edible ? (I don't have enough grain of salts to take my own
| words here...)
|
| It's a huge stretch to image that being competitive with
| conventional agriculture. Still, just imagining a situation
| where we could use electricity to turn CO2 into food...
| sk2020 wrote:
| There may be places where you would want access to starches,
| agriculture is not feasible, transportation costs are
| prohibitive, but you also have abundant power. I'm struggling
| to think of a place that meets all those criteria.
| yazaddaruvala wrote:
| Mars?
| xchaotic wrote:
| there's not much co2 on Mars
| You-Are-Right wrote:
| You are wrong. Please learn to check facts before
| posting, thanks.
|
| https://www.nasa.gov/directorates/spacetech/centennial_ch
| all...
| gavinray wrote:
| On a spacecraft with solar panels?
|
| The desert maybe?
| bertil wrote:
| Near Arctic regions like Lappland where I live fit the
| bill:
|
| * plenty of hydro power (which is why there's data centers
| and battery recycling);
|
| * agriculture isn't possible outside with no sun and meters
| of snow; there's greenhouses, including opaque ones with
| purely electric lighting but it's expensive;
|
| * transport by road is common, but harder in winter without
| fossil fuels and battery uncomfortable at -40oC/F.
|
| Any local activity could generate CO2, but the biggest
| existing one is paper mills.
| PeterisP wrote:
| If it's really more efficient than plants, then it would
| make sense to have solar panels combined with this process
| also in places where agriculture is feasible and there are
| no issues with transportation costs.
| [deleted]
| ghastmaster wrote:
| Leaving aside the future improvements(50% larger plants) in
| agriculture as well:
|
| https://futurism.com/the-byte/splice-human-gene-potatoes
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(page generated 2021-09-26 23:01 UTC)