研究：用排泄物生产生物燃料
While experts are developing 'greener' alternative fuel sources, a group of undergrads are creating a more natural one.
当专家们还在研发更环保的燃料时，一群在校生已经开始制作一种天然的燃料。
The team is working towards producing a biofuel that uses human and animal excretion, with the hopes of replacing harmful gasoline, diesel and jet fuel that dominate the market.
By engineering Bacillus subtilis, researchers are able to break down proteins and transform the left over material into alcohol biofuels and ammonia.
The US produces over 1 billion tons of animal and human waste every year, which does nothing but sit in an aerobically compost giving off harmful emissions.
David Wernick, a PhD candidate who graduated from the University of California, and his colleagues 'were struck by all the waste that is literally going to waste' and realized the material may have potential as a renewable fuel source, reports the University of California.
'We're working with anything such as agricultural waste like manure, municipal waste like sewage, plant matter, cellulosic matter and even carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere,' said Wernick in a video discussing the research.