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Engineering plants to consume more carbon dioxide

January 23, 2025 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

The most abundant protein on the planet is an enzyme called ribulose-1,5-bisphosphate carboxylase/oxygenase, better known as RuBisCO. Its critical role in photosynthesis makes life as we know it on earth possible. What it does is convert carbon dioxide from the atmosphere into the organic matter contained in plants.

Getting plants to take up more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere is a key strategy for mitigating climate change. Planting lots of trees is one way to do it. Another is to get individual plants to capture more carbon dioxide.

Scientists at the University of Illinois have focused on getting plants to produce more RuBisCO which allows them to grow faster, consuming more carbon dioxide in the process.

Some plants are better than others at taking advantage of the earth’s rising carbon dioxide levels. Among these are food crops like corn, sugarcane, and sorghum. Such plants’ growth is not primarily limited by how much carbon dioxide is in the atmosphere but rather by how much RuBisCO is in their leaves. The Illinois scientists tweaked genes in corn and sorghum to produce plants containing more RuBisCO. Laboratory experiments on corn demonstrated faster corn growth. Recent outdoor field experiments on sorghum demonstrated a 16% boost in its growth rate.

Improving photosynthesis in this way is not only a potential strategy for increasing plants’ ability to combat climate change. It is also a way to cope with the world’s increasing demand for food by producing crops that can grow larger and more quickly.

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Scientists Engineer Crops to Consume More Carbon Dioxide

Photo, posted April 12, 2016, courtesy of K-State Research and Extension via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Beaver Believers | Earth Wise

August 18, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Beavers are ecosystem engineers based on their ability to construct dams and create ponds. By doing so, they create wetland habitat for other species. They create biodiversity by allowing plant species to emerge in new places as they clear out existing trees and other plants. Beavers improve water quality and their dams store water during droughts. Their handiwork minimizes flood risk and mitigates flooding impacts.

Before beavers were widely trapped, there were beaver dams just about everywhere in the American west. Now beaver rewilding is trying to restore many western ecosystems. In places like Idaho, ranchers have gone from seeing beavers as a nuisance to actually recruiting them onto their land. One cattle rancher began stream restoration on his land with beaver rewilding in 2014. By 2022, he was a firm “beaver believer”. There are now over 200 beaver dams along Birch Creek near Preston, Idaho, and the stream now flows 40 days longer into the year.

NASA has established a team to investigate the extent to which beavers can have an outsized and positive impact on local ecosystems. The team is using NASA’s Earth Observation satellites to observe the effects beavers are having. Satellites can collect data from large areas and can pass over the same areas regularly and across seasons. The goal is to support people on the ground who are implementing beaver rewilding efforts to increase water availability and to increase habits for fish and other species. NASA’s project will run through 2025 and it plans to expand it to other states with similar terrain and water management strategies.

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Researchers Become “Beaver Believers” After Measuring the Impacts of Rewilding

Photo, posted February 23, 2021, courtesy of Deborah Freeman via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio

Harvesting Water From The Air | Earth Wise

August 11, 2023 By EarthWise Leave a Comment

Engineers at MIT have created a superabsorbent material that can soak up significant amounts of moisture from the air, even in desert-like conditions.

The material is a transparent, rubbery substance made from hydrogel, which is a naturally absorbent material that is already widely used in disposable diapers. The MIT researchers enhanced the absorbency of hydrogel by infusing it with lithium chloride, which is a type of salt that is a powerful desiccant.

They found that they could infuse hydrogel with more salt than was possible in previous studies. Earlier studies soaked hydrogels in salty water and waited 24 to 48 hours for the salt to infuse into the gels. Not much salt ended up in the gels and the material’s ability to absorb water vapor didn’t change much. In contrast, the MIT researchers let the hydrogels soak up the salt for 30 days and found that far more salt was absorbed into the gel. The result was that the salt-laden gel could then absorb and retain unprecedented amounts of moisture, even under very dry conditions.

Under very dry conditions of 30% relative humidity, the gels captured 1.79 grams of water per gram of material. Deserts at night have those levels of relative humidity, so the material is capable of generating water in the desert.

The new material can be made quickly and at large scale. It could be used as a passive water harvester, particularly in desert and drought-prone regions. It could continuously absorb water vapor from the air which could then be condensed into drinking water. The material could also be used in air conditioners as an energy-saving, dehumidifying element.

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This salty gel could harvest water from desert air

Photo, posted July 26, 2021, courtesy of Ivan Radic via Flickr.

Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio