Thread Game Changer?

Just her, she's the scientist.

I thought you were both scientists, my bad.

Most strains of e. coli are harmless. E coli is all up in your intestines right now. There are two main types of e. coli- enteric (in your gut) and hemorrhagic (from outside the gut, causes internal bleeding due to vascular dialation from a toxin produced by the bug). It's when you get a virulent strain such as O157:H7 (the O and the H denote various phenotypes of their O-antigen and their Hemagglutin), which has gotten a lot of press due to food-borne illnesses stemming from mass-produced food plants, then you have a problem. We use e. coli in our lab all the time- it's exceptionally genetically pliable and harmless.

Thank you very much for that. I knew next to nothing about e.coli until I read your post.
 
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...rld-of-fossil-fuels-on-demand/article1871149/

A brave new world of fossil fuels on demand


In September, a privately held and highly secretive U.S. biotech company named Joule Unlimited received a patent for “a proprietary organism” – a genetically adapted E. coli bacterium – that feeds solely on carbon dioxide and excretes liquid hydrocarbons: diesel fuel, jet fuel and gasoline. This breakthrough technology, the company says, will deliver renewable supplies of liquid fossil fuel almost anywhere on Earth, in essentially unlimited quantity and at an energy-cost equivalent of $30 (U.S.) a barrel of crude oil. It will deliver, the company says, “fossil fuels on demand.”



This could be big.

Whelp, ttyl, middle east.
 
while I'm a little wary of the idea of any company being allowed to patent a genetic code the potential benefits far outweigh that concern
 
while I'm a little wary of the idea of any company being allowed to patent a genetic code the potential benefits far outweigh that concern

A company already did that with the breast cancer genes BRCA-1 and BRCA-2. They benefit from any situation regarding breast cancer genetic screening and therapy that manipulates those genes. It's terrible.
 
It's not, really. All bacteria are programmed to survive based on a simple algorithm of building block (such as sugars and amino acids) intake and processing, consumption, and then excreting. Their genetics dictate how certain building blocks get processed. So what would happen if you inserted a gene or overexpressed a gene to process something that it normally doesn't do/in large quantities? Bacteria can burp out shit that glows in the dark, so why not fuel products, or at least the components of fuel to make a decent product?

It's bullshit. The entire article is a lie designed to make us forget about our lack of vacation time.
 
I'd rather fuel my car with ancient dead animals than bacteria poo.

I hope this is taken into consideration before any changes come about.