Powering Nitrogenases: New ways for sustainable fertiliser production

New targets for improving biocatalysts

26-Feb-2024 - Nitrogenases are considered promising candidates for the sustainable enzymatic production of ammonia and carbon compounds. One bottleneck in this complex process, the supply of electrons to the enzymes, has remained a mystery until now. Now a team at the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial ...

Tobias Erb receives the Leibniz Award 2024

Innovative, interdisciplinary research approach opens up new possibilities for developing technologies to address the global climate crisis

11-Dec-2023 - Prof. Dr. Tobias Erb, Director at the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology and Professor at the University of Marburg, has been awarded the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize by the German Research Foundation (DFG). The Leibniz Prize is the most important research award in Germany and ...

How lab-made catalysts can help to get a grip on difficult greenhouse gases

09-Nov-2023 - Natural gas consists of light hydrocarbons such as methane and ethane. Such gases are more potent greenhouse gases than CO2, are constantly released into the atmosphere from natural gas wells, and are more difficult to store than, for example, their corresponding alcohols (methanol and ethanol, ...

With formic acid towards CO₂ neutrality

Researchers develop a new method for the sustainable use of CO₂

16-May-2023 - New synthetic metabolic pathways for CO2 fixation could not only help to reduce the CO2 content of the atmosphere, but also replace conventional chemical manufacturing processes for pharmaceuticals and active ingredients with carbon-neutral, biological processes. A new study demonstrates a ...

How ethane-consuming archaea pick up their favorite dish

Scientists sucessfully decoded the structure of the enzyme responsible for ethane fixation

09-Jul-2021 - Hot vents in the deep sea are home to microbes that feed on ethane. They were discovered recently from scientists of the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology. Now the researchers from Bremen succeeded in finding an important component in the microbial conversion of the gas. They were able ...

Cellular powerplant recycles waste gases

The idea is to use the power of bacteria to turn toxic waste gases into valuable compounds such as acetate or ethanol

19-Nov-2020 - Carbon monoxide is a very poisonous gas. Humans die within minutes when they inhale it. However, some microorganisms tolerate carbon monoxide and even use it to breathe and replicate. Knowledge about how these bacteria survive opens a window into the primeval times of the earth and the origin of ...

Environmentally friendly production of mandelic acid

Scientists found a method for the "green" production of the important starting material for the chemical industry

29-May-2020 - Sometimes potentially useful enzymes are not easy to discover because their biocatalytic capabilities may go beyond their natural and thus known range of action. By recombining a newly discovered enzymatic capability, a research team from the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology led ...

In the active centre of carbon dioxide conversion

Scientists reveal the features of efficient carboxylase enzymes

12-Jul-2019 - In order to overcome the climate crisis, two measures are required: The reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, and removal of CO2 from the earth atmosphere. The latter is the goal of Tobias Erb's research group at the Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology in Marburg. Their ...

Potential for a green energy economy based on hydrogen

First Characterization of a Sensory [FeFe] Hydrogenase

11-Jan-2018 - Hydrogenases are enzymes capable of making hydrogen gas (H2) using protons from water, a reaction with relevance to a potential future green energy economy based on H2. Bacteria containing these enzymes often produce H2 as a waste product during sugar metabolism in the absence of oxygen. ...

From the scent of roses to nylon and plastics

Enzyme for plastics production from renewable raw materials

25-Apr-2016 - Beguiling scents, sober facts: scents emanating from plants are almost always monoterpenes and monoterpene alcohols, the essential oils of plants are natural hydrocarbon compounds. For instant, geraniol is the tempting fragrant alcohol of roses. Researchers of the Max Planck Institute for Marine ...