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LA JOLLA (May 6, 2021) Plants are unparalleled in their ability to capture CO2 from the air, but this benefit is temporary, as leftover crops release carbon back into the atmosphere, mostly through decomposition. Researchers have proposed a more permanent, and even useful, fate for this captured carbon by turning plants into a valuable industrial material called silicon carbide (SiC) offering a strategy to turn an atmospheric greenhouse gas into an economically and industrially valuable material.
In a new study, published in the journal
RSC Advances on April 27, 2021, scientists at the Salk Institute transformed tobacco and corn husks into SiC and quantified the process with more detail than ever before. These findings are crucial to helping researchers, such as members of Salk s Harnessing Plants Initiative, evaluate and quantify carbon-sequestration strategies to potentially mitigate climate change as CO2 levels continue to rise to unprecedented levels.
Harnessing plants to clear the air
Row after row of plants are being tested to see how much carbon dioxide they can suck out of the air. Author: Neda Iranpour (Reporter) Updated: 6:35 PM PDT April 21, 2021
SAN DIEGO The burning of fossil fuels sends carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and that is the leading cause of the warming of our planet. Plants help clear some of that carbon dioxide from the air. So what if scientists could harness those plants and have them clean the air even more? That’s what they’re doing at the Salk Institute and we have rare access into a greenhouse where this important research is happening.
Enhance La Jolla Day set for this weekend
The La Jolla Village Merchants Association is partnering with Enhance La Jolla, which administers the Maintenance Assessment District for The Village, and other community groups for Enhance La Jolla Day from 7 to 11 a.m. Saturday, March 20.
The community improvement day started as a way to get volunteers involved in ongoing projects, “but then it took on a life of its own” and is bringing together community groups such as the Village Merchants Association, Enhance La Jolla, La Jolla Community Foundation and La Jolla Town Council, said Enhance La Jolla President Ed Witt.
Salk Professor Wolfgang Busch named first incumbent of the Hess Chair in Plant Science eurekalert.org - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from eurekalert.org Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.