Gizmorama - April 8, 2015

Good Morning,

It appears that wastewater may help in creating biofuels.
Researchers are using wastewater to make algae which can be harvested to create biofuel. That's amazing! And it can possibly take care of two problems.

Learn about this and more interesting stories from the scientific community in today's issue.

Until Next Time,
Erin

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*-- Researchers use wastewater to grow algae for biofuels --*
HOUSTON (UPI) - Municipal wastewater makes for good algae food. And algae makes for a good filter. By growing high-volume strains of oil-rich algae in repurposed wastewater, researchers at Rice University have solved two problems with one process.

In the end, the algae can be harvested to make biofuels, and the wastewater can be processed and funneled back into the system. The algae effectively removes 90 percent of nitrates and more than 50 percent of phosphorous from the water, two pollutants which wastewater processing plants have not been able to find affordable ways to expel.

Excessive amounts of nitrates and phosphorous in wastewater runoff -- from agricultural and industrial sources -- have been blamed for encouraging unwanted algal growth in rivers and oceans.

The development could also, once again, make algae-based biofuels economically viable.

"Biofuels were the hot topic in algaculture five years ago, but interest cooled as the algae industry moved toward producing higher-value, lower-volume products for pharmaceuticals, nutritional supplements, cosmetics and other products," study author Meenakshi Bhattacharjee, a researcher at Rice's biosciences faculty, explained in a press release.

"The move to high-value products has allowed the algaculture industry to become firmly established, but producers remain heavily dependent on chemical fertilizers," Bhattacharjee added. "Moving forward, they must address sustainability if they are to progress toward producing higher-volume products, 'green' petrochemical substitutes and fuels."

The researchers experimental growth tanks featured different combinations of algal strains. Some hosted fish to prey on algae-eating zooplankyton. All the tanks were fed with filtered wastewater from the Houston Department of Public Works and Engineering. And all the tanks performed surprisingly well.

Bhattacharjee says more research will need to be done to confirm that the process is profitable, but their experiments produced higher volumes of algae and cleaner wastewater than previous efforts have. Performing the experiments in the late summer in Houston likely helped.

"Using wastewater would be one of the best solutions to make algaculture sustainable," she said. "If temperature is key, then cultivation may be more economical in the Southeast and Southwest."

The new research was published in the journal Algae.


*-- With new perfume, the more you sweat the better you smell --*
BELFAST, Northern Ireland (UPI) - What if perfume didn't wash away with sweat? What if perfume's effects weren't overpowered by body odor, but enhanced? Those are the ideas behind a new prototype fragrance from the science labs of Queen's University Belfast in Northern Ireland.

Scientists at Queen's University Ionic Liquid Laboratories have developed a perfume that smells better (stronger) as the user sweats. The fragrance's aromas are unlocked by the presence of moisture. As the sweat glands release more moisture, the perfume releases more of its aroma.

The fragrance itself isn't changed, but attached to an ionic liquid (salt in liquid form). In the presence of water, the ionic liquid relinquishes the fragrance onto the user's skin.

But that's not all. Incredibly, the solution also diminishes bad smells -- perfume and deodorant all in one. The sweat compounds (thiol compounds) responsible for body odors are naturally attracted to the ionic liquid, which absorbs the malodorous compounds and minimizes their foul scent.

The researchers are already working with commercial perfumers to bring their new technology to market.

"This is an exciting breakthrough that uses newly discovered ionic liquid systems to release material in a controlled manner," Nimal Gunaratne, project leader and head of the laboratories, said in a press release.

"Not only does it have great commercial potential, and could be used in perfumes and cosmetic creams, but it could also be used in others area of science, such as the slow release of certain substances of interest," Gunaratne added. "This innovative development demonstrates the drive of researchers at Queen's to advancing knowledge and achieving excellence for the benefit of society as a whole."

The new technology is detailed in the latest issued of the science journal Chemical Communications.

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