Producing ethanol from the cellulose in plant material may end up being be a part of the solution to humanity's energy woes, but right now the process is expensive, slow and inefficient. Now researchers at the Sandia National Laboratory in Livermore and UC Riverside are trying to draft some of the earth's oldest inhabitants into service for the cause. They're working with ancient microbes known as archaea, which live in some of the most hostile environments on the planet, such as hyper-saline lakes, acidic hot springs, and near-boiling deep ocean vents. They found that one strain, discovered in an Italian volcano, produces enzymes that break down the cell walls of plants, releasing the sugars within that can then be converted into ethanol. Now the scientists are working on improving the efficiency of the enzymes' activity, to make fuel production viable.

Source: David Perlman, Tough bacteria may hold promise in making biofuel. San Francisco Chronicle, May 15, 2007. Photo: Archaea live in some of the most extreme environments on Earth, such as the Grand Prismatic Spring in Yellowstone National Park, USA.