Microorganisms can react quickly to changes in their environment, making them useful tools in identifying potential leaks from underground carbon storage sites, according to a report published Monday in the journal Trends in Biotechnology. “The ubiquitous presence of microorganisms in all environments on Earth, combined with their ability to respond rapidly to environmental changes and their various pathways for assimilating CO2, makes them ideal candidates for biological CCS monitoring,” the report says.
The researchers, based at the Scottish Association for Marine Science and the University of Oslo in Norway, pointed to a recent study conducted at a simulated carbon leak. “During the gas release, an increase in abundance of CO2-fixing bacterial taxa, accompanied with changes in bacterial activity, was seen in the surface sediment,” the report says.
