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Burning fuel for transport is the third largest contributor of greenhouse gasses and strategies to eliminate this carbon footprint need to be developed.
The by-product of hydrogen fuel consumption is water thus hydrogen is a highly attractive carbon neutral fuel. Current systems that isolate hydrogen are energy
intensive and therefore environmentally and economically costly. In addition, the storage of hydrogen presents huge challenges as hydrogen is extremely flammable.
In nature, hydrogen can be transformed to formic acid in a benign environment without high energy input. Formic acid, which is not flammable in 85% concentrations,
can be treated to re-generate hydrogen fuel in situ. By employing biotechnology, our aim is to mimic the natural enzymatic process to store hydrogen in the safe form
of formic acid. Not only will this methodology save energy, the "stored" fuel will then be able to be transported easily and safely.
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Professor Christopher J. Easton
B.Sc. Flinders University; Ph.D. D.Sc., University of Adelaide, FAA
Chris Easton is a graduate of Flinders University and the University of
Adelaide. He held positions at Harvard University (1980-1981), the Research
School of Chemistry (1982), the University of Canterbury (1983-1986) and
the University of Adelaide (1986-1994), before his appointment as a Senior
Fellow in the Research School of Chemistry, in 1995.
He was awarded a D.Sc. from the University of Adelaide in 1998 and is the recipient of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute Birch Medal for 2000, and the Archibald Oll? Prize for Chemical Literature for 2000. He was promoted to Professor at the Research School of Chemistry in 2001 and elected as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science in 2004.
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Dr Amy Philbrook (Principle Investigator)
B.Sc. Chem. Eng., The University of Maine, USA; Ph.D. The Australian National University
Expertise:
· Structural elucidation of large molecules for structure / function relationships
· Fluorescent labelling of synthetic and natural polymers
· Downstream development of chemical / protein processes
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Dr Hye-Kyung Kim (Senior Research Chemist)
B.Sc., M.Sc., Yeungnam University, South Korea; Ph.D. Chalmers University of Technology (CTH), Sweden
Expertise:
· Engineering and directed evolution of enzymes
· Protein expression, purification and structural determination
· SAR studies of biological systems
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Dr James Hennessy (Research Chemist)
M.Chem., The University of Aberdeen, Scotland; Ph.D. The Australian National
University
Expertise:
· Biocatalysis
· In vitro protein synthesis
· Enzyme genetic engineering and post-translational chemical modification
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Dr Hideki Onagi (Research Chemist)
B.Sc., University of Western Sydney; B.Sc.(hons.), Ph.D. The Australian National University
Expertise:
· Enzyme kinetics
· HPLC enzyme assay development
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Mr Daniel Bartkus (Project Technician)
Expertise:
· Enzyme kinetics
· HPLC enzyme assay development
· Technical support
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