Center for Advanced BioEnergy Research, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Friday, October 28, 2011

St. Anthony Falls Laboratory makes algae cell swimming discovery

Biorefining Magazine
By Luke Geiver October 25, 2011

The St. Anthony Falls Laboratory on the banks of the Mississippi River in downtown Minneapolis originally formed to study hydroelectric energy, but today the research team at St. Anthony is working on projects that range from wind energy to the swimming patterns of algae. Miki Hondzo, civil engineering professor and team leader at the facility, explained the research projects currently happening there to the participants of the 2011 Algae Biomass Summit preconference workshop. Hondzo had a clear message on the challenges of scaling up from the lab to the commercial level: “You have to understand mechanics, you have to understand processes at mechanistic levels,” he said. For Hondzo and his team, that means understanding the swimming signatures of algae.

Read more