En un estudio publicado en General Microbiology, cient铆ficos alemanes describen la obtenci贸n de un nuevo tipo de biodiesel obtenido mediante microorganismos, denominado microdiesel, que utiliza como materia prima az煤cares o material celul贸sico que es fermentado por bacterias transformadas gen茅ticamente.
En esta noticia de junio ya se hablaba de este tema.
Se trata de Escherichia coli que expresa genes de las bacterias Zymomonas mobilis y Acinetobacter baylyi, que permiten una producci贸n de etanol y una subsiguiente esterificaci贸n. El resultado son etil esteres de 谩cidos grasos (FAEE) constituidos principalmente por etil-oleato con peque帽os porcentajes de etil palmitato y etil palmitoato. Se tratar铆a de un biodiesel algo diferente al actual, que est谩 constituido por metil diester, al ser resultado de la reacci贸n de metanol con aceites.
De ser viable en el futuro una producci贸n de este tipo se abrir铆a la posibilidad de un biodiesel de segunda generaci贸n, que utilizar铆a materiales agr铆colas de bajo coste, como paja, madera o ca帽as, en lugar de granos, reduciendo los graves problemas de la competencia de los cultivos bioenerg茅ticos con los alimentarios.
Actualmente existen proyectos avanzados de investigaci贸n de producci贸n de bioetanol celul贸sico, muchos de los cuales se basan tambi茅n en el uso de la transformaci贸n gen茅tica de microorganismos.
Seria muy util el mail de Veronica Caballero para poder hacerle consultas mas especificas. sobre su trabajo .. nenalinda1987@hotmail.com
Spanish company touts process to turn urban waste into biodiesel
By Ron Kotrba
A group of Spanish developers working under the company name Ecofasa, headed by chief executive officer and inventor Francisco Angulo, has developed a biochemical process to turn urban solid waste into a fatty acid biodiesel feedstock. 鈥淚t took more than 10 years working on the idea of producing biodiesel from domestic waste using a biological method,鈥 Angulo told Biodiesel Magazine. 鈥淢y first patent dates back to 2005. It was first published in 2007 in Soto de la Vega, Spain, thanks to the council and its representative Antonio Nevado.鈥
Using microbes to convert organic material into energy isn鈥檛 a new concept to the renewable energy industries, and the same can be said for the anaerobic digestion of organic waste by microbes, which turns waste into biogas consisting mostly of methane. However, using bacteria to convert urban waste to fatty acids, which can then be used as a feedstock for biodiesel production, is a new twist. The Spanish company calls this process and the resulting fuel Ecofa. 鈥淚t is based on metabolism鈥檚 natural principle by means of which all living organisms, including bacteria, produce fatty acids,鈥 Angula said. 鈥淸It] comes from the carbon of any organic waste.鈥
He defined urban waste as 鈥渙rganic wastes from home like food, paper, wood and dung,鈥 and added that any carbon-based material can be used for biodiesel production under the Ecofa process. 鈥淔or many years, I wondered why there are pools of oil in some mountains,鈥 he said, explaining the reasoning behind his invention. 鈥淎fter delving into the issue, I realized that [those oil deposits] were produced by decomposing organic living microorganisms.鈥 This, in Angulo鈥檚 mind, sparked the idea that food waste and bacteria could be turned into fatty acids that could react into biodiesel. Two types of bacteria are under further development by Biotit Scientific Biotechnology Laboratory in Seville, Spain: E. coli and Firmicutes. The Ecofa process also produces methane gas, and inconvertible solids that can be used as a soil amendment or fertilizer. 鈥淭here is a huge variety of bacteria,鈥 Angulo said. 鈥淐urrently, [biodiesel producers] receive a fat that must be processed through transesterification into biodiesel, but we are also working on other types of bacteria that are capable of producing fatty acids with the same characteristics as biodiesel.鈥 He said this would eventually allow producers to skip the transesterification step.
Ecofasa may avoid the ongoing food-versus-fuel debate and its expected successor, indirect land use, with its Ecofa process. 鈥淚t would not be necessary to use specific fields of maize, wheat, barley, beets, etc., which would remain for human consumption without creating distortions or famines with unforeseeable consequences,鈥 the company stated in a press release. 鈥淭his microbial technique can be extended to other organic debris, plants or animals, such as those contained in urban sewage. You can even experiment with other carbon sources, and this opens up a lot of possibilities. It is only necessary to find the appropriate bacteria.鈥
The company created its name by combining the term 鈥渆co-combustible鈥 with F.A., the initials of the inventor.
鈥淭oday we feel that we can produce between one and two liters [of biodiesel] per 10 kilograms of trash,鈥 Angulo said. That鈥檚 a little more than one-fourth to one-half of a gallon for every 22 pounds of trash鈥攐r between 24 and 48 gallons per ton of urban waste. 鈥淲e are working to improve that,鈥 he said.
http://www.youtube.com/user/agnux
[…] Tambi茅n son muchas las modificaciones gen茅ticas que se realizan para obtener bacterias modificadas que permitan producir biodiesel o biog谩s o hidr贸geno. […]