Environmental/Energy/Sustainability

Green technology holds the promise of significantly reducing carbon emissions and helping humanity to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. But without buy-in from individuals and groups — whether it’s building new habits and routines to conserve energy or galvanizing support to enact policies that will enable the transition to cleaner tech — progress is likely to occur far more slowly than what is needed.

Strains of microbes like yeast and E. coli can be engineered to produce useful chemicals and fuels, and can produce more fuel more efficiently by working together. The problem is that when grown together in co-cultures, the fastest-growing strain often outcompetes the others, causing the community to break down and stop chemical production. Now, Princeton researchers have discovered a new way to stabilize co-cultures of microbes using light.

Engage 2021, Princeton’s second annual innovation and entrepreneurship conference, will be held online Dec. 1 and 2. The conference, which is free and open to everyone, offers opportunities to learn about, and catalyze, the transformation of discoveries into innovations that benefit society — from biomedicine and clean energy to wireless, cryptocurrency and quantum computing.

For Princeton University to meet its energy needs, along with its goal of achieving net-zero carbon emissions by its 300th anniversary in 2046, a complete rethinking is required on how energy is used and supplied in every lab, every office, every dorm room, in each parking lot and garage — even on pathways and playing fields.