Yahoo Answers is shutting down on May 4th, 2021 (Eastern Time) and beginning April 20th, 2021 (Eastern Time) the Yahoo Answers website will be in read-only mode. There will be no changes to other Yahoo properties or services, or your Yahoo account. You can find more information about the Yahoo Answers shutdown and how to download your data on this help page.

Mikira
Lv 5
Mikira asked in EnvironmentGlobal Warming · 1 decade ago

I wonder if we can cultivate these ancient creatures?

Stromatolites cyanobacteria are the oldest bacterium on earth and they are what scientists believed created the oxygen we breath.

"Even more dramatically, the photosynthesis carried out by the stromatolites was on such a large scale that they consumed most of the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and released enough oxygen to make permanent changes."

http://ircamera.as.arizona.edu/NatSci102/text/extf...

http://www.sharkbay.org/terrestial_enviroment/page...

http://goaustralia.about.com/od/wa/f/stromatolites...

(Yes I read the whole first website, so I know it claims we are second only to this creature inregards to changing the climate. I don't agree with that statement, but for those of you who do, maybe my greenhouse idea would work if we could find away to utilize these little creatures. Since they can handle more CO2 than a plant can.)

Update:

Gengi - It already is surviving in Africa and Australia.

5 Answers

Relevance
  • 1 decade ago
    Favorite Answer

    Cyanobacteria are otherwise known as blue green algae and are found everywhere on earth. Cultivation is an excellent idea and has been thoroughly investigated as a means to make biofuels. http://www.unh.edu/p2/biodiesel/article_alge.html

    The research cited suggests that the US could produce all of its current transportation fuel requirements from aquaculture of algae in a relatively modest area (30,000 sq miles). The cultivation of algae has several other advantages:

    1. The cost of production is less than the cost of conventional oil at current prices. Better, the jobs and economic activity would all be domestic. Wealth would stay in America rather than be exported for oil.

    2. The capital cost to secure a domestic supply is comparable to the cost of invading and occupying oil rich Iraq. Investing in domestic infrastructure would have been a better choice for the US as a whole, but sometimes special interests prevail.

    3. The carbon cycle is a closed loop. There is no net contribution of CO2 to the atmosphere.

    4. Combined with sequestration at a power plant, the process would actually be CO2 negative and help to reverse the greenhouse effect.

    Source(s): Email me for more information. My lab allocates about 3% of its research effort to this topic (to adapt the California research results to local conditions in Canada). and I have done radio on this topic.
  • Anonymous
    1 decade ago

    You're so close,but yet so far! Yes,those little critters did produce enough oxygen to alter the content to levels we enjoy today. So if a tiny ,one celled organism can do all that,why is it such a stretch to imagine how all the cars,trucks,boats,home furnaces,etc,spewing such vast amounts of CO2 over the last 200 years,would have no effect? Do you know how many tons of CO2 an average car puts into atmosphere every year? Gasoline doesn't just 'go away' when it's burned. It converts into other gases and compounds as energy is released. Nothing is lost,only changed. Just because you can't see CO2 leaving the tailpipe,it's there. So,do some more research,and let's see where this goes.

    Source(s): Yahoonews 12/30/07, "2007 A year of weather records!"
  • 1 decade ago

    well if there are scientists thinking this way maybe we can be saved and find better ways to learn to live. i mean its worth a try before it comes to us but of caorse we're not the ones that will die from this mess it will be generations from us and that is what we are trying to protect not so sure how long we'll remain on this earth and of coase the fase it could blow up anytime and they say from the bibile but you know alot is uforisms i believe. its interesting thought and hope something comes of it.

  • Gengi
    Lv 5
    1 decade ago

    the main problem is storing that carbon, it has to be stored in the biosphere so ether it will need to be burred underground or it will be emitted back into the atmosphere.

    also i dont think it would survive at current levels of CO2, it may require larger concentrations to be effishant. eaven if it dose survive plants that have already adapted to present levels of CO2 would sill be most likely more effishant.

  • How do you think about the answers? You can sign in to vote the answer.
  • 1 decade ago

    My wishes to you, hope you succeed. We are starving for Oxygen every day.

Still have questions? Get your answers by asking now.