New Technique Identifies Populations Within a Microbial
Community Responsible for Biomass Deconstruction
One of the keys to commercialization of advanced biofuels is
the development of cost-competitive ways to extract fermentable sugars from
lignocellulosic biomass. The use of enzymes from thermophiles – microbes that
thrive at extremely high temperatures and alkaline conditions – holds promise
for achieving this. Finding the most effective of these microbial enzymes,
however, has been a challenge. That challenge has now been met by a
collaboration led by researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Joint
BioEnergy Institute (JBEI).