I’m not completely sold on ethanol in any form, although switchgrass and waste biomass versions are much more appealing than food product biofuel.
If the technology is going to make it in practice, breakthroughs like this will help it get there.
From the link:
New genetically modified bacteria could slash the costs of producing ethanol from cellulosic biomass, such as corn cobs and leaves, switchgrass, and paper pulp. The microbes produce ethanol at higher temperatures than are possible using yeast, which is currently employed to ferment sugar into the biofuel. The higher temperature more than halves the quantity of the costly enzymes needed to split cellulose into the sugars that the microbes can ferment. What’s more, while yeast can only ferment glucose, “this microorganism is good at using all the different sugars in biomass and can use them simultaneously and rapidly,” says Lee Lynd, an engineering professor at Dartmouth College, who led the microbe’s development.
David Kirkpatrick 