Monthly Archives: August 2012

Bacteria is something of a dirty word. They’re everywhere, invisible and insidious, waiting for their chance to climb into your body and wreak havoc. But before you reach for your hand sanitizer and start counting your sick days, take a moment to consider the many uses that people have found for bacteria. Bacteria are essential in making yogurt and cheese, fixing nitrogen for our crops, and they help us digest our food. In the near future, Damian Palin would like to add mining the ocean to the list of things bacteria do for us. Damian Palin, a geomicrobiologist working in Singapore, has been developing bacteria strains that can be used to precipitate useful minerals out of the briny effluent produced by desalination plants. If he is successful, he would be killing two birds with one stone: useful minerals that would otherwise go to waste could be extracted,

In space, no one can hear you pee… But you’ll be able to safely drink it down again after it’s gone through the International Space Station’s Water Recovery System. According to NASA, the Water Recovery System, carried to the ISS by the space shuttle Endeavour, can recycle up to 93% of the water fed into it and reduce overall water consumption aboard the space station by 65%. However, the Water Recovery System has been experiencing problems with calcium fouling, which led NASA to contact Saltworks Technologies of Vancouver, CA. Saltworks was contracted by NASA to build and deliver a pilot device that would test water recovery systems and may potentially be used aboard the ISS itself. If successful, the system will be the latest of Saltworks’ unique water treatment solutions. One such solution is the proprietary Thermo-Ionic process for desalination. This process can reduce energy costs by up to 80% in comparison to more tradition