Supercomputers Help Solve Puzzle-Like Bond for Biofuels

Host Jorge Salazar reports from the Texas Advanced Computing Center an interview with Klaus Schulten, professor of Physics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. One of life's strongest bonds has been discovered by a science team doing research on biofuels with the help of supercomputers. The biomolecular interaction binds at about half the strength of a chemical covalent bond the pieces of a finger-like system of proteins called cellulosomes used by bacteria in cow stomachs to digest plants. The researchers published their results in the journal Nature Communications in December of 2014. Their find could boost efforts to develop catalysts for biofuel production from non-food waste plants.