In New York state, scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Brookhaven National Laboratory and collaborators at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) have engineered duckweed to produce high yields of oil. The team added genes to one of nature’s fastest growing aquatic plants to “push” the synthesis of fatty acids, “pull” those fatty acids into […]
In New Jersey, duckweed is an excellent laboratory model for scientists to discover new strategies for growing hardier and more sustainable crops in an age of climate change and global population boom, a Rutgers-led study finds. Researchers from Rutgers, the Salk Institute and an international team of specialists reviewed the anatomy, growth, physiology and molecular […]
In Pennsylvania, with a $1.7 million grant from the National Science Foundation, Penn State researchers will investigate how duckweed could be grown on Pennsylvania farms to limit nutrient pollution into the Chesapeake Bay. Duckweed, a tiny plant resembling a lily pad, grows rapidly in water with elevated levels of nitrogen and phosphorus, often the result […]
In Russia, researchers of Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University (SPbPU) in collaboration with Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH) completed an international joint project to create a resource and CO2-neutral energy closed-loop technology from microalgae Chlorella sorokiniana and duckweed Lemna minor. The main objective of the project was development and implementation of an innovative […]
Duckweed is some pretty amazing stuff. And no, we aren’t talking about that kind of Daffy Duck duck weed. We are talking about the green stuff that grows in ponds and floats on the surface of water, often mistaken for algae. Why is this green goodness so good? Duckweed, also referred to as lemna or […]
In California, Greenbelt Resources Corporation has announced the signing of a Letter of Intent (LOI) with Prosys Biorefining Systems to license its proprietary ECOsystem biorefinering technology to convert lemna (duckweed) and microalgae into renewable products. Prosys, based in San Pedro, Calif., is developing an organic aquatic plant-based source of concentrated protein from duckweed as a […]
Some of the excitement around duckweed has faded – why, we’re not sure. But a band of researchers have ploughed on and from “The Second International Conference on Duckweed Research and Applications” last year, Prof. Dr. Eric Lam (Rutgers University and Conference Chair) and PD Dr. Klaus-J. Appenroth (University of Jena and Head of the […]
