Name: J. Craig Venter Title: CEO, Synthetic Genomics Location: La Jolla, Calif.
Why algae? You look at the potential output from algae, and it’s one to two orders of magnitude better than the best agricultural system. If we were trying to make liquid transportation fuels to replace all transportation fuels in the U.S., and you try and do that from corn, it would take a facility three times the size of the continental U.S. If you try to do it from algae, it’s a facility roughly the size of the state of Maryland. One is doable, and the other’s just absurd.
Everybody is looking for a naturally occurring alga that is going to be a miracle cell to save the world, and after a century of looking, people still haven’t found it. We hope we’re different. The genetic tools give us a new approach to being able to rewrite the genetic code and get cells to do what we want them to do.
To read the full, original article click on this link: Craig Venter Explains How Pond Scum Will Save the World: Scientific American
