Cropping systems that are profitable for farmers and balance societal needs for food, feed, fuel, energy and clean air and water are the focus and challenge of Iowa State University’s Landscape Biomass Project.

Iowa State University engineers have upgraded a biofuels pilot plant to improve its efficiency, instrumentation, data collection, reliability and maintenance. The upgrades have already bumped the pilot plant's processing rate from 7 kilograms of biomass per hour to 10 kilograms per hour. 

Kenny McCabe and James Schrader grabbed two pots of marigolds and placed them on a greenhouse bench. On the left, in a pot made from a biorenewable mix of soy protein and polylactic acid, was a thick plant with three orange-gold blooms and four buds about to pop, its leaves a rich and dark green. 

Several national reporters toured Iowa biofuels facilities including the BioCentury Research Farm. 

A new algae production facility at Iowa State University makes use of an innovative design that’s attracting interest from other universities and private industry. The algal production facility, which was built inside a greenhouse on the BioCentury Research Farm in rural Boone, went online in January and has been filling orders for algae researchers ever since.

The BioCentury Research Farm had a display at the 2013 ISU Day at the capitol on February 25. More than a dozen exhibits were set up around the rotunda of the capitol for legislators, staff and other elected officials to learn more about Iowa State University. 

Initial studies show a fungus grown in the leftovers of ethanol production could be a good energy feed for pigs and chickens. In separate feeding trials, nursery pigs and chickens have eaten high-protein fungi that Hans van Leeuwen and other Iowa State University researchers have produced in a pilot plant that converts ethanol leftovers into food-grade fungi. 

Iowa’s three Regents universities are making faculty hires, launching studies, and building industry partnerships – all in a $22 million effort to boost the state’s research capacity in renewable energy. 

The microorganism that colors ponds and lakes green could become an important partner in the future of poultry operations through a project conducted by ISU researchers. 

DuPont has won the 2012 Sustainable Biofuels Award in the Sustainable Feedstock Innovation Category for its Stover Harvest Collection Project. 

Seedstock, a blog for sustainable agriculture, features the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and the BioCentury Research Farm in a recent blog post.

Biofuels expansion is having a tremendous impact on the distillers' grain markets in Iowa and across the Midwest -- and the small towns that support their production. Bobby Martens, an Iowa State assistant professor of supply chain management, says ethanol industry leaders need to reconsider investments in transportation equipment and infrastructure while the government adjusts policies to effectively move all that biofuel to market.

Biofuels expansion is having a tremendous impact on the distillers' grain markets in Iowa and across the Midwest -- and the small towns that support their production. Bobby Martens, an Iowa State assistant professor of supply chain management, says ethanol industry leaders need to reconsider investments in transportation equipment and infrastructure while the government adjusts policies to effectively move all that biofuel to market.

Soil scientists believe one of the reasons that former prairie soils are so productive is because of the fires that raged through the grasslands over many millennia.

The USDA awarded an Iowa State University-led group a $25 million grant from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture to develop the blueprint for using marginal farmlands to grow perennial grasses that will, in turn, provide a biomass source for a drop-in biofuel-based fuel over the next five years. The multi-state, interdisciplinary team is lead by Ken Moore, Charles F. Curtiss Distinguished Professor in the Department of Agronomy.

The National Science Foundation is investing $20 million and the Iowa Power Fund another $2 million to build Iowa's research capacity in sustainable energy systems. Iowa's public universities -- Iowa State University, the University of Iowa and the University of Northern Iowa -- will make up the core of the research project. The project will also include partnerships with the state's community colleges, private colleges, school districts, government agencies and industries. The project will support studies in bioenergy, wind energy, energy utilization and energy policy.

The Hybrid Processing Laboratory located just inside the front door of Iowa State University's new Biorenewables Research Laboratory is increasingly busy. It's a place where researchers in biochemical and thermochemical sciences work together to develop technologies that produce biorenewable fuels and chemicals. And it's a showcase for the multidisciplinary work promoted by Iowa State's Bioeconomy Institute.

Farmers can still see yields of more than 200 bushels per acre while using cover crops to protect the soil, improve water quality and capture carbon in the soil, according to new research by ISU's Ken Moore, professor in ISU's Department of Agronomy.

Iowa State's Hans van Leeuwen and a team of researchers have built a pilot plant to test a process designed to improve ethanol production. They're growing fungi on some of ethanol's leftovers to make a quality animal feed and to clean water so it can be recycled back into fuel production. The researchers think the fungi could also be developed into a low-cost nutritional supplement for people.

The Biofuels Digest recognizes Iowa State University as Institutional Research Facility of the Year