Anaerobes in the News
This week my power word in the news is anaerobic, and I found the article titled: “Gut Instinct” by Sonia Fernandez. According to this article, a professor of chemical engineering at UC Santa Barbara, Michelle O’Malley, is doing research on anaerobic microbes. Specifically, O’Malley is using the microbes found in the guts of plant-eating animals, which are able to break down the tougher parts of the plant that usually require “harsh treatments and powerful enzymes to release the sugars.” These microbes have evolved a way to process this plant material that is usually unable to be processed, within this material is lots of energy that is stored in cellulose that is broken down into sugars. The goals of this research is to turn plant waste into value-added chemicals, fuels and materials. O’Malley sees the potential to use these anaerobic microbes to greatly improve the biotechnology industry.
This article was published by the University of California Santa Barbara. The article is well written and easy to understand, although, some of the article was about an award that Michelle O’Malley received for this research. The article is somewhat of an interview with O’Malley so the information is accurate just not peer-reviewed or fact checked. Although the article is not all that credible, it is informative and sparks more questions to be explored about the topic.