Cow Enzyme Could Make Ethanol More Efficient to Produce

First posted on 10-06-2008

Could the answer to more efficient use of corn to make ethanol lie inside a cow’s stomach? That’s exactly what Michigan State University professor Mariam Sticklen thinks.

Most manufacturers currently use just the kernels to produce corn based ethanol. But scientists understand that a corn plant stores almost half its energy elsewhere, like in the leaves and stems. These materials are usually discarded because the cellulose fiber is too tough for manufacturers to break down without costly chemical compounds.

So Stricklen began to study how a cow’s stomach quickly breaks down foods high in cellulose materials, and she wondered whether the digestive enzymes might be replicated in a laboratory.

Stricklen took a gene from a cow and placed it inside a corn cell. The gene was able to produce an enzyme capable of breaking down thick plant materials. But, since the enzyme could destroy the plant, it was critical that it be placed in the right spot or the plant would pretty much digest itself.

She chose the cell’s vacuole, a safe spot because the enzyme could be stored along with other cell waste and not be released until the plant was ready to be processed.

The culmination of Stricklen’s efforts became Spartan Corn III, a method for breaking down cellulose into the same sugars the ethanol industry pulls out of corn kernels. Edenspace Systems Corp., based in Kansa, wasted no time in securing the rights to Stricklen’s technology breakthrough.

Bruce Ferguson, Edenspace CEO, said,"We see this whole area of developing new, value-added crops as one of the key elements in solving the world’s need for more food and fuel.”

The company is hard at work trying to put together a commercial application of the Spartan Corn III method. It hopes that will be available by 2011.