Microbially-Enhanced Vanadium Mining and Bioremediation Under Micro- and Mars Gravity on the International Space Station.

As humans explore and settle in space, they will need to mine elements to support industries such as manufacturing and construction. In preparation for the establishment of permanent human settlements across the Solar System, we conducted the ESA BioRock experiment on board the International Space Station to investigate whether biological mining could be accomplished under extraterrestrial gravity conditions. We tested the hypothesis that the gravity () level influenced the efficacy with which biomining could be achieved from basalt, an abundant material on the Moon and Mars, by quantifying bioleaching by three different microorganisms under microgravity, simulated Mars and Earth gravitational conditions.

Space station biomining experiment demonstrates rare earth element extraction in microgravity and Mars gravity.

Microorganisms are employed to mine economically important elements from rocks, including the rare earth elements (REEs), used in electronic industries and alloy production. We carried out a mining experiment on the International Space Station to test hypotheses on the bioleaching of REEs from basaltic rock in microgravity and simulated Mars and Earth gravities using three microorganisms and a purposely designed biomining reactor. Sphingomonas desiccabilis enhanced mean leached concentrations of REEs compared to non-biological controls in all gravity conditions.

Assessing the role of bed sediments in the persistence of red mud pollution in a shallow lake (Kinghorn Loch, UK).

Red mud is a by-product of alumina production. Little is known about the long-term fate of red mud constituents in fresh waters or of the processes regulating recovery of fresh waters following pollution control. In 1983, red mud leachate was diverted away from Kinghorn Loch, UK, after many years of polluting this shallow and monomictic lake.

Daily magnesium fluxes regulate cellular timekeeping and energy balance.

Circadian clocks are fundamental to the biology of most eukaryotes, coordinating behaviour and physiology to resonate with the environmental cycle of day and night through complex networks of clock-controlled genes. A fundamental knowledge gap exists, however, between circadian gene expression cycles and the biochemical mechanisms that ultimately facilitate circadian regulation of cell biology. Here we report circadian rhythms in the intracellular concentration of magnesium ions, [Mg(2+)]i, which act as a cell-autonomous timekeeping component to determine key clock properties both in a human cell line and in a unicellular alga that diverged from each other more than 1 billion years ago.

Influences upon the lead isotopic composition of organic and mineral horizons in soil profiles from the National Soil Inventory of Scotland (2007-09).

Some 644 individual soil horizons from 169 sites in Scotland were analyzed for Pb concentration and isotopic composition. There were three scenarios: (i) 36 sites where both top and bottom (i.e.

Phosphoglycerate mutase from Trypanosoma brucei is hyperactivated by cobalt in vitro, but not in vivo.

Production of ATP by the glycolytic pathway in the mammalian pathogenic stage of protists from the genus Trypanosoma is required for the survival of the parasites. Cofactor-independent phosphoglycerate mutase (iPGAM) is particularly attractive as a drug target because it shows no similarity to the corresponding enzyme in humans, and has also been genetically validated as a target by RNAi experiments. It has previously been shown that trypanosomatid iPGAMs require Co(2+) to reach maximal activity, but the biologically relevant metal has remained unclear.

A comparison of the isotopic composition of lead in rainwater, surface vegetation and tree bark at the long-term monitoring site, Glensaugh, Scotland, in 2007.

The lead concentrations and isotopic ratios (206Pb/207Pb, 208Pb/206Pb, 208Pb/207Pb) of 31 rainwater (September 2006-December 2007) and 11 surface vegetation (moss, lichen, heather) samples (October 2007) from the rural upland catchment of Glensaugh in northeast Scotland and of nine bark samples (October 2007) from trees, predominantly Scots pine, in or near Glensaugh were determined. The mean 206Pb/207Pb ratios for rainwater in 2006 and 2007 were similar to those previously determined for 2000 to 2003 at Glensaugh, yielding an average mean annual value of 1.151+/-0.

Historical trends in the lead isotopic composition of archival Sphagnum mosses from Scotland (1838-2000).

The analysis of almost 200 Scottish Sphagnum moss samples collected over the past 170 years has revealed trends in the isotopic composition of lead similar to those previously established for dated Scottish lake sediments and peat bogs, lending credibility to these proxy records of atmospheric lead contamination and deposition. The effect of temporal variations in contributions from sources such as smelting of indigenous lead ores (206Pb/207Pb approximately 1.16-1.