Dr. Timothy J. Marks

Biography

Dr. Marks’ research interest involves the development of genetic tools for Geobacillus species, a bacteria capable of growth at 55 degrees Celsius that are also capable of producing ethanol. The development of those tools involves utilizing genes from previously undiscovered bacteriophages that infect geobacilli and introducing them into the bacterial cells for the purposes of genetic engineering. These bacteria have shown great promise for the production of ethanol at high temperatures, a process that would be advantageous over the current method of ethanol production using yeast. Ethanol is typically toxic to yeast and bacterial cells and it vaporizes at 50 degrees Celsius, so production of ethanol by geobacilli would allow for continuous production of ethanol at 55 degrees Celsius if a vacuum was used to remove the vaporized ethanol from the bacterial cells immediately upon production.