Gnashing my teeth over my unrequited love for “my President” and his failure to be the Commander, James Liao rekindled hope in my oil-soaked heart.

In this podcast I talk to James Liao, a professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at UCLA. I spoke to Dr. Liao about his research into engineering microbes to make fuel.

Today, we get most of the fuel for our cars out of the ground. It’s a process fraught with dangerous consequences, from the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico to the rise in global temperatures thanks to greenhouse gases. Dr. Liao is among a growing number of scientists who think that microbes can help us out of this predicament.

We talked about the attraction of microbe-derived fuels, and the challenges of getting bacteria to turn air, water, and sun into something that can power your car.

I’m marveling at how Liao can contemplate solving humanity’s fuel consumption problems by turning cyanobacteria – chimera created from pond scum – into stills converting carbon dioxide into 4-carbon alcohol that today’s cars could burn. I know, I know, it’s early days. But, a scientifically-minded citizen can dream, right?

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Filed under: Academia, Energy, Podcasts, Science Tagged: algae, carbon dioxide, carl zimmer, isobutanol cyanobacteria, james liao