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Engineered Tobacco Leaves to Produce More Biofuel

Posted on Monday, January 4, 2010 posted by posted by Mak @ 8:27 PM

Researchers at the Biotechnology Foundations Laboratories at Thomas Jefferson University have found out a way to increase biofuel production from tobacco plants by engineering two genes, which increase the oil in tobacco leaves.

The researchers have identified two genes - the diacyglycerol acytransferase (DGAT) gene and the LEAFY COTYLEDON 2 gene. Plants modified to over-express these genes produce more oil. While a typical tobacco plant contains about 1.7% to 4% of oil per dry weight, engineered plants carry about 6.8% of oil, which can be converted into biofuel.

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but there was no oil Then, from algae came oil.
Now, the algae are still there, but oil is fast depleting
In future, there will be no oil, but there will still be algae  
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This is what we try to do at Oilgae.com - explore the potential of getting oil from algae