Pee power: Urine-loving bug churns out space fuel

[Bosonic]

Scientists on Sunday said they had gained insights into a remarkable bacterium that lives without oxygen and transforms ammonium, the ingredient of urine, into hydrazine, a rocket fuel.

So-called anammox -- for anaerobic ammonium oxidation -- germs caused a sensation when they were first identified in the 1990s, but uncovering their secrets is taking time.

In a letter published by the British science journal Nature, researchers at Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands reported they had identified the molecular mechanism by which the bugs do their fuel-trick.

"Proving this was quite a feat," said Mike Jetten, professor of microbiology at the university's Institute for Water and Wetland Research.

http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-10-pee-power-urine-loving-bug-churns.html

[AndyTiedye]

1. Pee into Rocket Fuel, Right On!

Let's get the space program cranked up again. I don't think we'll run out of pee any time soon.

[Warpy]

2. I wonder if there's something similar living on Titan

It would explain a lot about that moon/coplanet.

[MBS]

3. great story, thanks. n/t

[cantbeserious]

4. Self-Fueling Rocket Flight To Mars - Self Fueling Low Cost Space Program

The possibilities are endless!

[MisterP]

5. like "Gasland," except you're the faucet

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

6. Hydrazine...

It's not a rocket fuel, per se. It is a rocket fuel additive that makes combustion of Nitrated fuels far more efficient. It was used in the OKC bomb, along with Nitromethane. Makes a very potent mixture.

On edit: it is also very toxic on the skin and very unstable in mixture with nitrated fuels.

[eppur_se_muova]

8. N2H4 is a fuel, has been used in rockets ...

along with MMH and UDMH. Hydrazine is a poor choice because it has too high a freezing point, and is unstable in anhydrous form. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerozine

For example, the Apollo LM and CSM used various hydrazine mixtures as fuel and N2O4 as oxidant -- a so-called hypergolic mixture, which ignites spontaneously. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Command/Service_Module

What you are thinking of is that some nitrated fuels are oxygen-poor or oxygen-rich -- nitromethane, for example, is a monopropellant, with fuel and oxidizer combined in the same molecule. Just heat it and it decomposes, "burning" without external oxygen (this makes for simple rocket motors). But nitromethane (CH3NO2) actually does not have enough oxygen to convert all C to CO2 and all H to H2O (N forms N2).

"Nitro" used in drag racers is usually a mixture of nitromethane and alcohol -- the alcohol is needed to sustain normal combustion in an air-fed IC engine. With pure nitromethane, I seem to recall the engines can't be started. {correction: Evidently they can, and some dragsters use straight nitromethane.} http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_fuel



ETA: The OKC bomb was ammonium nitrate (also fuel and oxidizer combined, but oxygen-rich) and the additive was fuel oil. This is a commonly-used mixture in industrial blasting -- both materials are cheap, and the recipe is widely known.




edited after checking stoichiometry :blush:

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

9. If you check back on the history...

And some of the official chemical analysis of the OKC bomb, you will find that chemical footprints of both Hydrazine and Nitromethane were found at the OKC site. Further investigation will find that they traced back the purchases of drums of Nitromethane. Where they got the Hydrazine is anyone's guess.

Nitro and Hydrazine was used in NHRA Top Fuel for a very short time back in the late 60's, until they got tired of the explosions and banned Hydrazine.

[phantom power]

7. I'm having this vision of the bladder infection that might give you.