A bacterium that turns toxic chemicals into solid gold

Canadian scientist have get a line a midget alchemist in disguise , the bacterium Delftia acidovorans . When this microbe is infused within a toxic mixture of water - soluble atomic number 79 , it excrete a molecule that both protects it from the elements while also transforming the venomous ions into hearty nanoscale gold particles . It ’s a discovery that could someday allow for the conversion of mine waste matter into Au , or the creation of gold structures with singular property .

Details of this noteworthy biochemical process wererecently publishedthe journal Nature Chemical Biology . The paper ’s authors , who work at McMaster University in Ontario , did not look specifically at the viability of using this particular sales booth of bacteria to grow gold from a liquid mixture , but noted that such processess are “ clearly potential . ”

In the paper itself , researcher Chad Johnston , Nathan Magarvey and colleagues observe that the “ determination is the first demonstration that a release metabolite can protect against toxic gold and stimulate golden biomineralization . ”

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Nature News explainsmore :

Using biochemical and genome analysis , the researchers discovered a set of genes and a chemical substance metabolite that were responsible for precipitating the Au . Bacteria engineered to lack the genes no longer formed dark haloes , and their growth was stunted in the mien of gold . The team also isolated a chemical substance give rise by the unengineered bacterium that cause amber particles to fall out of a result . The chemical substance was dubbed delftibactin .

The research worker suggest that the genes they identified are need in produce delftibactin and shunting it outside the cubicle . By fall atomic number 79 , D. acidovarans may keep the metallic element from go into its cell in solution . But Magarvey read that it is possible that D. acidovarans also employ other mechanisms to detoxify Au that breaches its cell wall .

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