Ethanol & Zea mays
Zea mays has been in the news quite a bit lately. It has been used recently in as an alternative biofuel to gasoline and is quickly gaining popularity. Zea mays is being used to make ethanol. Ethanol is the most popular biofuel currently being produced because of the abundance of corn all over the world. In 2006, there were 128 factories in 21 states producing ethanol and that number has grown. E85, the biofuel produced from corn, is now being sold at over 850 different gas stations.
Number
of Fueling Stations that Offer E85 in the United States
Some Fun Facts about Corn
-Corn, rice
and wheat provide the chief sources of energy in the human diet.
-China is the leading importer of corn.
-In the United States about half of the corn harvested each year is used to feed for livestock.
-Kernels are ingredients in many breakfast cereals and salad dressings.
-Corn is also used to make ceramics, drugs, paints, paper goods and textiles.
-In countries like Latin America, Africa and Asia corn is a major part of the human diet, but it lacks protein. Many of the people of these countries suffer from protein malnourishment. Scientists in Mexico have recently developed a modified type of corn that has high amounts of protein in it.
-Corn is found in penicillin and vitamins
-There are about 250 different races of corn.
-Corn ranges in size for three feet tall to twenty feet tall.
References
Bettelheim, A., 2006. Biofuels Boom. Pages 793-816. CQ Researcher. CQ Press. Washington D.C., U.S.A.
Hill, W. G., 2005. Genetics: a century of corn selection. Pages 683-684. Science. American Association for the Advancement of Science. New York City, New York, USA.
Iowa State University 2004. <http://www.extension.iastate.edu/newsrel/2004/may04/may0430.html>. Accessed 22 April 2008.
Mangelsdorf, P. C., 1974. Corn: it's origin, evolution, and improvement. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA.
Nature Publishing Group 2008. <http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v435/n7038/fig_tab/nature03481_F5.html>. Accessed 21 April 2008.
Plants for a Future Database 2006. <http://www.ibiblio.org/pfaf/cgi-bin/arr_html?Zea+mays>. Accessed 1 April 2008.
Plants for a Future 2004. <URL: http://www.pfaf.org/database/plants.php?Zea+mays>. Accessed 2 April 2008.
Salvador, R.J., 2003. The world book encyclopedia. World Book, Inc., Chicago, Illinois, USA.
Texas A & M University 1996. <http://plantpathology.tamu.edu/Texlab/Grains/Corn/corn.html>. Accessed 4 April 2008.
The United States Department of Agriculture 2008. <URL: http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=ZEMA>. Accessed 1 April 2008.
Warman. A., 2003. Corn & capitalism: how a botanical bastard grew to global dominance. University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA.
Wittens, S. & Nagtegaal, S. 2007. <http://sliceoftheday.wordpress.com/2007/04/15/maize-zea-mays/>. Accessed 7 April 2008.
More webpages on Zea mays...
http://www.ibiblio.org/pfaf/cgi-bin/arr_html?Zea+mays
http://sliceoftheday.wordpress.com/2007/04/15/maize-zea-mays/
http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=ZEMA
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