(275c) Biofuels: Challenges in Research During Deployment

The challenge of converting sustainable cellulosic biomass into fuels has the opportunity for science and technology making an appreciable national impact in the next 20 years. Bioenergy interest is driven partly by economics and national security. In bioenergy, there is a need to accelerate the development and adoption of second and third generation technologies for production and conversion while the first generation technologies are being deployed. Three major questions are: can we convert lignocellulose into usable substrates (i.e., sugars) and into fuels efficiently and cost-effectively; can we produce enough biomass to make a significant impact; and can we accomplish this sustainably? I will discuss the bioenergy drivers and the biological approaches being taken to address them. This will include the new BioEnergy Science Center (www.bioenergycenter.org). Part of the confidence in the success in conversion is due to the application of new tools from modern systems biology. The BioEnergy Science Center (BESC) is exploring two hypotheses. First, that this one-step, game-changing strategy can be improved by engineered microbes. Second, that synergies between modified reduced recalcitrance plants can be exploited with improved enzymes and microbes. BESC is mining natural diversity for new biocatalysts, especially under thermophilic conditions. Model CBP organisms (such as Clostridium thermocellum and its cellulosomes) are used to explore how the microbes and enzymes interact with the plant cell walls. Strategies and processes for using and implementing CBP are examined.