U.C. Berkeley researchers get $793K biofuel grant
Two scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, got a three year, $793,000 grant to work on making corn plants with leaves and stems useful for biofuel.
The U.S. Department of Energy gave the money.
Markus Pauly and Sarah Hake, both in Cal’s plant and microbial biology department, will study the genetic diversity of corn to create better strains for biofuels.
Right now, only corn kernels are used for fermentation to make ethanol in this country, and many critics complain that this is inefficient and wasteful. Corn kernels are also needed for animal food in agricultural husbandry. Since the kernels make up just a quarter of a corn plant, finding a way to use the other bits would be quite helpful.
Different types of corn are more genetically distinct from each other than humans and chimpanzees (which tells you something, too, about humans and chimps) and Pauly and Hake hope to capitalize on this diversity.
The grant is named in the cumbersome cant of the academy: "Identification and Genetic Characterization of Maize Cell Wall Variation for Improved Biorefinery Feedback Characteristics."
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